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Wirral Peninsula

The Wirral Peninsula, known locally as the Wirral, is a peninsula in North West England. The roughly rectangular peninsula is about 15 mi long and 7 mi wide, and is bounded by the Dee Estuary to the west, the Mersey Estuary to the east, and Liverpool Bay to the north.

Historically, the Wirral was wholly in Cheshire; in the Domesday Book, its border with the rest of the county was placed at "two arrow falls from Chester city walls". However, since the Local Government Act 1972, only the southern third has been in Cheshire, with almost all the rest lying in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Merseyside. An area of saltmarsh and reclaimed land adjoining the south-west of the peninsula lies in the Welsh county of Flintshire.

Toponymy
The name Wirral literally means "myrtle corner", from the Old English wir, a myrtle tree, and heal, an angle, corner or slope. It is supposed that the land was once overgrown with bog myrtle, a plant no longer found in the area, but plentiful around Formby, to which the Wirral would once have had a similar habitat. The name was given to the Hundred of Wirral (or Wilaveston) around the 8th century.

Prehistoric settlement
The earliest evidence of human occupation of the Wirral dates from the Mesolithic period, around 12,000 BC. Excavations at Greasby have uncovered flint tools, signs of stake holes and a hearth used by a hunter-gatherer community. Other evidence from about the same period has been found at Irby, Hoylake and New Brighton. Later Neolithic stone axes and pottery have been found in Oxton, Neston, and Meols. At Meols and New Brighton there is evidence of occupation through to the Bronze Age, around 1,000 BC, and funerary urns of the period have been found at West Kirby and Hilbre.

Before the time of the Romans, the Wirral was inhabited by a Celtic tribe, the Cornovii. Artefacts discovered in Meols suggest it was an important port from at least 500 BC. Traders came from Gaul and the Mediterranean localities to seek minerals from North Wales and Cheshire. There are remains of a small Iron Age fort at Burton, for which the town was named (burh tūn being Old English for "fort town").

The Romans and Britons
Around AD 70, the Romans founded Chester. Evidence of their occupation on the Wirral has been found, including the remains of a road near Mollington, Ledsham and Willaston. This road may have continued to the port at Meols, which may have been used as a base for attacking the north Wales coast. Storeton Quarry may also have been used by Romans for materials for sculpture. Remains of possible Roman roads have also been found at Greasby and at Bidston. By the end of the Roman period, pirates were a menace to traders in the Irish Sea, and soldiers may have been garrisoned at Meols to combat this threat.

Although Roman rule ended with the departure of the last Roman troops in 410, later coins and other material found at Meols show that it continued to operate as a trading port. Evidence of Celtic Christianity from the 5th or 6th centuries is shown in the originally circular shape of churchyards at Bromborough, Woodchurch and elsewhere, and also in the dedication of the parish church at Wallasey to a 4th-century bishop, Hilary of Poitiers. The Celtic names of Liscard and Landican (from Llandecwyn) both suggest an ancient British origin. The name of Wallasey, meaning "Welsh (or foreigners') island", is evidence of British settlement. The Welsh name, both ancient and modern, for the Wirral is Cilgwri. In Welsh mythology, the ouzel (or blackbird) of Cilgwri was one of the most ancient creatures in the world.

English and Norse
The Anglo-Saxons under Æthelfrith, king of Northumbria, laid waste to Chester around 616. Æthelfrith withdrew, leaving the area west and south of the Mersey to become part of Mercia, and Anglo-Saxon settlers took over the Wirral except the northern tip. Many of the Wirral's villages, such as Willaston, Eastham and Sutton, were established and named at this time.

Towards the end of the 9th century, Vikings began raiding the area. They settled along the Dee side of the peninsula, and along the sea coast, giving their villages names such as Kirby, Greasby and Meols. They introduced their own local government system with a parliament at Thingwall. The pseudo-historical Fragmentary Annals of Ireland appears to record the Hiberno-Scandinavian settlement of the Wirral peninsula in its account of the immigration of Ingimundr near Chester. This Irish source places this settlement in the aftermath of the Vikings' expulsion from Dublin in 902, and an unsuccessful attempt to settle on Anglesey soon afterwards. Following these setbacks, Ingimundr is stated to have settled near Chester with the consent of Æthelflæd, co-ruler of Mercia. The boundary of the Viking colony is believed to have passed south of Neston and Raby, and along Dibbinsdale. Evidence of Norse speech on the Wirral can still be seen from place name evidence – such as the common -by (meaning "village" in Scandinavian languages) – suffixes and names such as Tranmere, which comes from trani melr ("cranebird sandbank"). Viking Age sculpture corroborates this. Recent Y-DNA research has also revealed the genetic trail left by Scandinavians on the Wirral, specifically relatively high rates of the haplogroup R1a, associated in Britain with Scandinavian ancestry.

Bromborough on the Wirral is also one of the possible sites of an epic battle in 937, the Battle of Brunanburh, which confirmed England as an Anglo-Saxon kingdom. This is the first battle where England united to fight the combined forces of the Norsemen and the Scots, and thus historians consider it the birthplace of England. The battle site covered a large area of the Wirral. Egil's Saga, a story which tells of the battle, may have referred to the Wirral as Wen Heath, Vínheíþr in Icelandic.

The Normans and the early Middle Ages
After invading England in 1066 and subduing Northumbria in 1069–1070, William the Conqueror invaded and ravaged Chester and its surrounding area, laying waste to much of the Wirral. The Domesday survey of 1086 shows that the Wirral then was more densely populated than most of England, and the manor of Eastham, which covered most of the east of the peninsula from Bidston to the River Gowy, was the second largest in Cheshire. Of the 28 former lords of the Wirral manors listed, 12 bore Norse names. By 1086, most of the area was in the hands of Norman lords such as Robert of Rhuddlan, his cousin Hugh d'Avranches, and Hamo de Mascy. The survey shows 405 family heads living in the peninsula, suggesting a total population of 2,000–3,000.

The Earls of Chester ruled the whole of the County Palatine, including the Wirral, almost as "a kingdom within a kingdom" for about 250 years. Between 1120 and 1123, Earl Ranulph le Meschin made several edicts that converted the Wirral into a hunting forest. This made the area subject to Forest Law which made the hunting of game, such as deer and boar, by unauthorised persons subject to harsh penalties. To enforce the forest laws was a chief forester who was appointed with a ceremonial horn, and the position soon became a hereditary responsibility of the Stanley family. However, after complaints from minor Wirral landowners about the wildness of the area and oppression by the Stanleys, Edward the Black Prince as Earl of Chester agreed to a charter confirming the disafforestation of the Wirral, shortly before his death from amoebic dysentery. The proclamation was issued by his father Edward III on 20 July 1376.

At the end of the 12th century, Birkenhead Priory stood on the west bank of the Mersey at a headland of birch trees, from which the town derives its name. The ruined priory is Merseyside's oldest surviving building and its Benedictine monks provided the first official Mersey ferry service around 1330, having been granted a passage to Liverpool by a charter from Edward III. At this time, large areas of Wirral were owned by Chester Abbey. In 1278 the Abbey was granted the right to hold an annual three-day fair at Bromborough, but the fair declined after the Black Death in 1349. Another fair was established in 1299 at Burton. Meanwhile, Meols continued as an important port, and the eroded coastline there has provided what is described as "the largest collection of medieval domestic items to have come from any single site outside London".

The 16th, 17th and 18th centuries
A Subsidy Roll of 1545 shows that the population of the Wirral was no more than 4,000. The peninsula was divided into 15 parishes (Wallasey, Bidston, Upton, Woodchurch, West Kirby, Thurstaston, Heswall, Bebington, Bromborough, Eastham, Neston, Burton, Shotwick, Backford and Stoke). Most parishes were subdivided into smaller townships, of which the largest in terms of population were Neston, Burton, Wallasey, Tranmere (then within the parish of Bebington) and Liscard, and were the same size as small rural villages. The Wirral's proximity to the port of Chester influenced the history of the Dee side of the peninsula. From about the 14th century, Chester provided facilities for trade with Ireland, Spain, and Germany, and seagoing vessels would "lay to" in the Dee awaiting favourable winds and tides. As the Dee started to silt up, harbouring facilities developed at Shotwick, Burton, Neston, Parkgate, Dawpool, and "Hoyle Lake" or Hoylake. However, there was not a gradual progression of development, and downstream anchorages such as that at Hoyle Lake (which replaced Meols) were in occasional use from medieval times, depending on the weather and state of the tide. The main port facilities were at Neston and Parkgate.

At the same time, larger ships and economic growth in Lancashire stimulated the growth of Liverpool. The first wet dock in Britain was opened in Liverpool in 1715, and the town's population grew from some 6,000 to 80,000 during the 18th century. The need to develop and protect the port led to a chain of lighthouses being built along the north Wirral coast. The commercial expansion of Liverpool, and the increase in stage coach traffic from Chester, also spurred the growth of ferries across the River Mersey. By the end of the 18th century the Wirral side of the Mersey had five ferry houses, at Seacombe, Woodside, the Rock, New Ferry and Eastham.

Other communications were also improving. Turnpike roads linking Chester with Eastham, Woodside, and Neston were built after 1787. In 1793, work began on the Ellesmere Canal, connecting the Mersey with Chester and Shropshire through the fluvioglacial landform known as the Backford gap, and the town of Ellesmere Port began to develop.

The excavation of the New Cut of the Dee, opened in 1737, to improve access to Chester, diverted the river's course to the Welsh side of the estuary and took trade away from the Wirral coastline. Although plans were made to overcome its gradual silting up, including one in 1857 to cut a ship canal from a point between Thurstaston and Heswall to run along the length of the Wirral to Chester, this and other schemes came to nothing, and the focus of general trade moved irrevocably to the much deeper Mersey. However, from the late 18th century there was coal mining near Neston, in tunnels stretching up to 2 mi under the Dee, and a quay at Denhall was used for coal exports.

The 19th century
The first steam ferry service across the Mersey started in 1817, and steam-powered ships soon opened up the Wirral's Mersey coast for industrialisation. The 1820s saw the birth of the area's renowned shipbuilding tradition when William Laird opened his shipyard in Birkenhead, later expanded by his son John Laird. The Lairds were largely responsible for the early growth of Birkenhead, commissioning the architect James Gillespie Graham to lay it out as a new town modelled on Edinburgh. In 1847, Birkenhead's first docks and its municipal park, the first in Britain and the inspiration for New York's Central Park, were opened, and the town expanded rapidly. Bolstered by migration from Ireland, Wales and rural Cheshire, Birkenhead's population of less than one thousand in 1801 rose to over 33,000 by 1851, and to 157,000 by 1901. The town became a borough in 1877, incorporating within it Oxton and Tranmere.

The improved communications also allowed Liverpool merchants to buy up and develop large estates on the Wirral. James Atherton and William Rowson developed the resort of New Brighton, and new estates for the gentry were also built at Egremont, Oxton, Claughton and Rock Ferry. Arrowe Hall was built for the Shaw family in 1835.

In the mid-19th century docks were established at Birkenhead and in the Wallasey Pool, and continuing development for a wide range of industry both there and along the banks of the Mersey. The New Chester Road was opened in 1833. The Wirral's first railway was built in 1840, planned by George Stephenson and connecting Birkenhead with Chester. In 1852 Price's Patent Candle Company built a factory and model village at Bromborough. This was followed in 1888 by William Lever's establishment of the much larger Sunlight soap factory and Port Sunlight garden village, designed to house its employees and provide them with a benign environment. The opening of the Manchester Ship Canal in 1894, with its outfall at Eastham, led to further port-side and industrial development beside the Mersey at Ellesmere Port.

In 1886, the Mersey Railway tunnel was opened, linking the Wirral and Liverpool. This led to the further rapid growth of suburbs in the Wirral, particularly in Wallasey, Hoylake and West Kirby, and later Bebington and Heswall. Wallasey's population grew to over 53,000 by 1901, and the town also achieved borough status soon after the turn of the century.

The 20th century
The dockland areas of Wallasey and Birkenhead continued to develop and prosper in the first half of the century, specialising in trade with Africa and the Far East. A host of other port-related industries then came into existence, such as flour milling, tanning, edible oil refining and the manufacture of paint and rubber-based products. In 1922 a new oil dock was built at Stanlow near Ellesmere Port, and in 1934 oil refining began there. A large chemical and oil refining complex still dominates the area.

In 1929, the 3rd World Scout Jamboree was held at Arrowe Park and this celebrated the 21st Anniversary of the publication of Scouting for Boys. Thirty-five countries were represented by 30,000 Scouts, plus another 10,000 British Scouts who took the opportunity to camp in the vicinity.

The rail tunnel under the Mersey was supplemented by a vehicle tunnel in 1934, the Queensway Tunnel. A third tunnel opened in 1971, the Kingsway Tunnel, connecting with the M53 motorway which now runs up the centre of the peninsula. These new roads contributed to the massive growth of commuting by car between Liverpool and the Wirral, and the development of new suburban estates around such villages as Moreton, Upton, Greasby, Pensby, and Bromborough.

In 1940–1941, as part of the Blitz, parts of the Wirral, especially around the docks, suffered extensive bomb damage. There were 464 people killed in Birkenhead and 355 in Wallasey, and 80% of all houses in Birkenhead were either destroyed or badly damaged. During the Second World War, the Wirral held two RAF sites, RAF West Kirby (which was a camp, not an airfield) and RAF Hooton Park and a number of anti-aircraft sites to protect the docks of Birkenhead and Liverpool.

After the Second World War, economic decline began in the older industries in the area which had started to become known as Merseyside. However, there continued to be industrial development along the Mersey between Birkenhead and Ellesmere Port, including the large Vauxhall Motors car factory on the site of RAF Hooton Park.

The 21st century
Plans were announced in 2006 for a £4.5bn development around the docklands to be called Wirral Waters. The development is a mixture of industrial, office, residential and leisure facilities. Planning permission was granted in 2010 and work began on the site in 2011, with development work potentially lasting for 30 years.

Geography
The Wirral can be defined both as a geographical peninsula and as a socio-cultural area. The current Metropolitan Borough of Wirral has a population of 312,293 (according to the 2001 census), and covers an area of 60.35 sqmi, bounded by the Cheshire Plain, the Dee and the Mersey. The Irish Sea lies to its north west side.

Geology
The peninsula is formed almost wholly from sedimentary bedrock of Triassic age, being sandstone, mudstones and siltstones. Strata exposed at or near the modern surface include the following (in stratigraphic order i.e. uppermost/youngest at top):

 * Mercia Mudstone Group
 * Sidmouth Mudstone Formation
 * Tarporley Siltstone Formation
 * Sherwood Sandstone Group
 * Helsby Sandstone Formation (divided into an upper Frodsham Sandstone Member and a lower Delamere Member in places)
 * Wilmslow Sandstone Formation
 * Chester Pebble Beds Formation
 * Kinnerton Sandstone Formation

A small outcrop of Carboniferous rocks occurs around Little Neston, being an extension of the Flintshire Coalfield across the Dee estuary. These Coal Measures rocks were formerly exploited by a small mining operation.

The strata have a slight, generally easterly dip and are cut by numerous extensional faults most of which are aligned broadly north–south. For the most part the bedrock is poorly exposed being covered by superficial deposits of Quaternary age. Notable exposures of the Helsby Sandstone occur at Bidston Hill and at Red Rocks at the northwestern tip of the Wirral along with the tidal islands at Hilbre. Elsewhere Mercia Mudstone rocks outcrop prominently at Caldy Hill, Thurstaston Common and Heswall Dales.

Much of the Wirral is covered by a mantle of glacial till, a legacy of the last ice age. Wind-blown sands cover the northern coastal margin. Low ground behind these sand are reclaimed tidal flat deposits which also extend into the heavily modified Birket which occupies a buried bedrock channel. This channel and others beneath the Dee and Mersey estuaries were formed in part by the southeasterly movement of Irish Sea Ice during successive ice ages. Low cliffs of the Kinnerton Sandstone at Burton Point are part of a relict shoreline, the Dee estuary having silted up during the post-glacial period. The former coast can be traced from Blacon northwest to Burton Point and thence to Parkgate where spring tides still reach the historic coastline. A well developed glacial drainage channel, known as the Deva Spillway cuts across the base of the peninsula between the two estuaries on either side of the Wirral and is interpreted as having played a major part in the deglaciation of the region in late-glacial/post-glacial times.

Physical geography
Although it has been stated that "it is difficult to find any work in which there is a written description of the exact area defining the Wirral Peninsula", historian Stephen Roberts defines it as "the peninsula which is bounded by the Dee and Mersey estuaries, Irish Sea and... the route of the Shropshire Union Canal between Ellesmere Port and Chester". This definition extends the original hundred slightly further east, to the River Gowy.

The Shropshire Union Canal joins the Mersey at Ellesmere Port and the Dee at Chester. This canal technically makes the peninsula an island. In the north of the peninsula, the River Fender, Arrowe Brook and Greasby Brook drain into The Birket, which itself flows into the River Mersey via Wallasey Pool (Birkenhead Docks). Further south, the Clatter Brook and Dibbinsdale Brook drain into the Mersey at Bromborough Pool.

Two approximately parallel sandstone ridges run down the length of the peninsula. The western ridge is made up of Grange and Caldy Hills at 256 feet in height, then Thurstaston Hill (298 ft), Poll Hill in Heswall (350 ft, the highest point on the Wirral) and Burton (222 ft). The less continuous eastern ridge consists of Bidston Hill (231 ft), Prenton (259 ft) and Storeton Hill (229 ft). The shallow Fender valley runs between these ridges.

Climate
The Wirral features a temperate maritime climate (Köppen: Cfb) with mild summers, cool winters and rainfall spread evenly throughout the year.

A weather station was maintained on the peninsula, at Bidston, between 1845 and 2002.

Human geography
The major urban centres of the Wirral are to its east: these include Birkenhead and Wallasey. To the west and south, the Wirral is more rural. Two-thirds of the population of the Wirral live on one third of the land in Birkenhead and Wallasey, according to Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council. Other towns to the south and west of this area are usually considered part of the Wirral: notably, Ellesmere Port is often described as one of its "border towns". For regional economic planning, the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral is considered part of the Liverpool City Region.

Settlements
There are many towns and villages on the Wirral. Those administered by the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral are listed in List of towns and villages in Wirral (borough). Those also on the Wirral but administered by Cheshire West and Chester include:

M53 Divide
The M53 is also seen as an east–west divide between the affluent and developing areas of the Wirral.

Landmarks
Despite containing urban and industrial areas, the Wirral still has picturesque villages, sandy beaches, large areas of land owned by the National Trust, as well as views across the two estuaries and out into the Irish Sea. Wirral Council has identified over 130 public access points within its administrative area to beaches and to open water. Among the areas of open land are Bidston Hill, Caldy Hill, Eastham Country Park, including the Victorian Pleasure Gardens, Hilbre Island, North Wirral Coastal Park, Thurstaston Common and Thor's Stone and the Wirral Way. Ness Botanical Gardens are part of the University of Liverpool and have won many awards. The visitor centre at RSPB Burton Mere Wetlands provides birdwatching facilities in the Dee Estuary nature reserve.

Places of architectural interest include Hamilton Square, Rock Park and Port Sunlight. The view of the buildings on Liverpool's Pier Head when crossing on the Mersey Ferry is famous. Many villages of the Wirral such as Burton are also well preserved with their characteristic red sandstone buildings and walls. The old port of Parkgate also attracts many visitors. The arts are well represented by the Lady Lever Art Gallery at Port Sunlight and the Williamson Art Gallery in Birkenhead. The historical sites include Birkenhead Priory, Leasowe Lighthouse, Hadlow Road railway station and the buildings and ancient carvings on Bidston Hill.

Accents and dialects
For reasons that are both social and geographical, accents on the east side of the Wirral tend to show a stronger Merseyside influence than those on the west side. Neston once had a distinctive dialect derived from the migrant workers at the Denhall Colliery.

Wirral in literature

 * Sir Gawain spent Christmas on the Wirral before his confrontation with the Green Knight.
 * The wilderness of Wirral:
 * few lived there
 * Who loved with a good heart
 * either God or man

 * Olaf Stapledon, a writer, spent much of his life in West Kirby and Caldy, and many landscapes mentioned in his works can be identified.
 * Local historian John Lamb has claimed that both Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson based some of their major works on features on the Wirral Peninsula.
 * Jim Bennett, although born in Liverpool has lived for many years on the Wirral and in Heswall. Many landmarks, places and shops are used in his writing. His collection of poems Larkhill was nominated for the Ted Hughes Poetry Award.
 * The Wirral is described in Helen Forrester's book Twopence to Cross the Mersey (1974) as a place unreachable and comparably rich from the perspective of a poor girl struggling to live with her family in Liverpool during the Great Depression, despite having an aunt in West Kirby and the Mersey ferry costing just two old pence.
 * Maria V. Snyder named the maximum security prison in her book Spy Glass after the Wirral, after she was awarded the "Wirral paperback of the year" by school pupils for her earlier book Poison Study.
 * The Wirral is the setting of the novel Awaydays by Kevin Samson, published by Cape in March 1998 and filmed in 2009. Set in 1979, the story follows a music-loving young man who hides his middle-class background when he joins a group of hooligans who follow Tranmere Rovers.
 * Ramsey Campbell, a writer, has lived most of his life on the Wirral, and many of his novels and short stories explore landscapes in the area (e.g. Thurstaston Common in his novel Thieving Fear).

Television and film
The Wirral has hosted a variety of different films and television programmes. Chariots of Fire was filmed at various locations on the Wirral including the Oval Sports Centre, Bebington, the Woodside Ferry Terminal, and Bridge Cottage in Port Sunlight village, while the 1950 Ealing comedy The Magnet was filmed in Wallasey and New Brighton.

The 51st State was partly filmed around the docks in Birkenhead. Awaydays, based on a novel of the same name by Kevin Sampson, was filmed extensively on the Wirral. In 2012 the movie Blood, starring Paul Bettany and Stephen Graham was filmed on the Wirral.

The Queensway Tunnel in Birkenhead is also featured in the Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 during the scene where Harry and Hagrid escape on a flying motorcycle and pass through the tunnel. The scene was filmed while the tunnel was closed for repairs. The 2013 film Fast & Furious 6  tunnel chase scene was filmed in the Queensway Tunnel. The unused Birkenhead Dock branch of the Queensway Tunnel was filmed as a New York underpass in the 2014 movie Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit. In October 2017, the tunnel branch was used for the filming of the drama, Bulletproof, starring Noel Clarke and Ashley Walters.

Scenes for the 2016 film Florence Foster Jenkins, starring Hugh Grant and Meryl Streep, were filmed around New Brighton.

In television, sitcom Watching, produced by Granada Television between 1987 and 1993, was partly set and filmed at various Wirral locations, particularly Meols. More recently, Mike Bassett: Manager, starring Ricky Tomlinson was a follow-up to the film Mike Bassett: England Manager, and featured a fictional football club called Wirral County, a parody of Tranmere Rovers, who Bassett (Tomlinson) managed after being sacked from the England job.

It is also believed that the Lime Pictures production Hollyoaks films occasionally, on location, on the Wirral. The BBC comedy drama Candy Cabs filmed external scenes in West Kirby and Hoylake in 2011. Wallasey School featured in Grease: The School Musical on Sky One in 2009.

The BBC Two drama Peaky Blinders was filmed at various locations on the Wirral, including Port Sunlight village. The second series Peter Kay's Car Share also filmed at various Wirral locations including Meols and West Kirby. Sky One's 2016 thriller, The Five, starring Lee Ingleby shot scenes around the Wirral including in Port Sunlight.

The 2017 ITV drama Safe House starring Jason Watkins and Sunetra Sarker filmed several scenes on the peninsula.

In the autumn of 2017 filming began in Port Sunlight and Thornton Hough for a biopic about the author Tolkien starring Nicholas Hoult.

A row of cottages in the historic village of Port Sunlight also featured on the 2014 series of BBC Two's The Great Interior Design Challenge. The village also played host to two episodes of BBC One's The Antiques Roadshow hosted by Fiona Bruce.

In 2018, the feature film Official Secrets had two beach scenes filmed at Thurstaston beach on the Dee Estuary.

Media
Local news and television programmes are provided by BBC North West and ITV Granada, the local television station TalkLiverpool also broadcasts to the area. Television signals are received from the Winter Hill TV transmitter. With its close proximity with North Wales, BBC Wales and ITV Cymru Wales can also be received from the Moel-y-Parc TV transmitter.

Wirral is served by the local radio stations: BBC Radio Merseyside, Heart North West, Capital North West & Wales, Radio City, Smooth North West, Greatest Hits Radio Liverpool & The North West, Radio Wirral, and Wirral Wave Radio, a community based station.

The area is served by the local newspapers: Wirral Globe and Liverpool Echo.

Transport
The M53 motorway runs along the length of the Wirral, from near Chester. At the north eastern end, the Wirral is joined to Liverpool by three tunnels under the Mersey: two road tunnels, one from Wallasey (Kingsway) and one from Birkenhead (Queensway), and the Mersey Railway tunnel.

The Wirral peninsula is served by a network of bus routes. These are provided by larger companies whose networks of bus services in the North West of England are extensive, such as Arriva North West and Stagecoach Wirral. Furthermore, the peninsula is also served by many independent bus operators. Independent bus companies which operate on the peninsula include A2B Travel, Cumfybus, Helms Coaches and Eazibus.

Most bus services operate from the three bus stations: Birkenhead bus station, Heswall bus station and Woodside bus station, although many services start from other interchanges, such as New Brighton, Seacombe Ferry and Liscard Village.

The Wirral Line of the electrified Merseyrail network links West Kirby, New Brighton, Chester and Ellesmere Port via many other towns and villages to all four of Liverpool's city centre stations (James Street, Moorfields, Lime Street and Liverpool Central) through the underground Loop tunnel. Another railway line, the Borderlands Line, offers hourly diesel services from Bidston (on the West Kirby branch of the Wirral Line) to Wrexham in North Wales.

Regular Mersey Ferry crossings operate to Liverpool from both Woodside and Seacombe, providing a commuter shuttle and pleasure cruises.

The nearest passenger airports are Liverpool John Lennon Airport and Manchester Airport. There were plans to introduce commercial flights to nearby Hawarden Airport in North Wales, but these plans were dropped in 2014.

Football

 * Tranmere Rovers Football Club is the Wirral's only professional football club and play at Prenton Park, Birkenhead. They play in League Two of The Football League.
 * Cammell Laird 1907 F.C. are a non-league football club on the Wirral and play in the North West Counties League at North West Construction Stadium formerly Kirklands, Rock Ferry.
 * Several Football League teams have played at New Brighton including the defunct New Brighton Tower F.C. and New Brighton A.F.C., who most recently played in the West Cheshire League.

Golf

 * The Open Championship was played at the Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake in 1897, 1902, 1907, 1913, 1924, 1930, 1936, 1947, 1956, 1967, 2006, 2014 and 2023. The Women's British Open was played at Royal Liverpool in 2012.

Rugby

 * Caldy RFC play at Paton Field, Thurstaston. They are a rugby union club who play in England's second tier, the RFU Championship.
 * Wirral Warriors play at the Memorial Ground in Clatterbridge. They are members of the Rugby League Conference.
 * Birkenhead Park FC play at the Upper Park in Birkenhead Park and compete in the fifth tier of rugby union, National League 3 North.
 * Wirral Rugby Club founded 1936 by former pupils of Wirral Grammar School for Boys and play rugby union at Memorial Ground near Clatterbridge.
 * Anselmians RUFC formed 1947 by former pupils of St Anselm's College. They play rugby union at Eastham.
 * Hoylake RUFC
 * Port Sunlight RFC formed in 1908 by employees of the Lever Brothers company
 * Oldershaw RUFC
 * New Brighton RUFC
 * Wallasey RUFC

Watersports

 * Hoylake, in north west Wirral is one of the premier European land sailing (sand yachting) sites, and was host to the week-long European Championships in September 2007 and again in 2011.
 * West Kirby, in north west Wirral has a marine lake for windsurfing, sailing and sea kayaking and hosts the British Open Team Racing Championship (Wilson Trophy) sailing competition.
 * New Brighton is a popular place for jet-skiing as well as for paddle boarding and kitesurfing.

Cricket

 * Birkenhead Park Cricket Club
 * Birkenhead St Mary's Cricket Club
 * Irby Cricket Club
 * Neston Cricket Club
 * Upton Cricket Club
 * Wirral Cricket Club was founded in 1936 as part of the Wirral Club. The club became noted after recording the game's lowest score in 100 years, on 27 April 2014.

Other

 * Neston South Wirral Hockey Club, based at Neston Cricket Club, is the largest club on the Wirral with 8 men's and 5 ladies' sides playing each Saturday.
 * Oxton Hockey Club was founded in 1888 and is now a National League side.

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Congress Socialist Party

The Congress Socialist Party (CSP) was a socialist caucus within the Indian National Congress. It was founded in 1934 by Congress members who rejected what they saw as the anti-rational mysticism of Gandhi as well as the sectarian attitude of the Communist Party of India towards the Congress. Influenced by Fabianism as well as Marxism-Leninism, the CSP included advocates of armed struggle or sabotage (such as Yusuf Meherally, Jai Prakash Narayan, and Basawon Singh (Sinha) as well as those who insisted upon Ahimsa or Nonviolent resistance (such as Acharya Narendra Deva). The CSP advocated decentralized socialism in which co-operatives, trade unions, independent farmers, and local authorities would hold a substantial share of the economic power.

As secularists, they hoped to transcend communal divisions through class solidarity. Some, such as Narendra Deva or Basawon Singh (Sinha), advocated a democratic socialism distinct from both Marxism and reformist social democracy. During the Popular Front period, the communists worked within CSP.

History
JP Narayan and Minoo Masani were released from jail in 1934. JP Narayan convened a meeting in Patna on 17 May 1934, which founded the Bihar Congress Socialist Party. He was a Gandhian Socialist. Narayan became general secretary of the party and Acharya Narendra Deva became president. The Patna meeting gave a call for a socialist conference which would be held in connection to the Congress Annual Conference. At this conference, held in Bombay October 22–23 October 1934, they formed a new All India party, the Congress Socialist Party. Narayan became general secretary of the party, and Masani joint secretary. The conference venue was decorated by Congress flags and a portrait of Karl Marx.

In the new party the greeting 'comrade' was used. Masani mobilized the party in Bombay, whereas Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya and Puroshottam Trikamdas organized the party in other parts of Maharashtra. Ganga Sharan Singh (Sinha) was among the prominent leaders of the Indian National Congress Party as among the founders of the Congress Socialist Party. The constitution of the CSP defined that the members of CSP were the members of the Provisional Congress Socialist Parties and that they were all required to be members of the Indian National Congress.

Members of communal organizations or political organizations whose goals were incompatible with the ones of CSP, were barred from CSP membership. The Bombay conference raised the slogan of mobilising the masses for a Constituent Assembly.

In 1936 the Communists joined CSP, as part of the Popular Front strategy of the ComIntern. In some states, like Kerala and Orissa, communists came to dominate CSP. In fact communists dominated the entire Congress in Kerala through its hold of CSP at one point.

In 1936, the CSP began fraternal relations with the Lanka Sama Samaja Party of Ceylon. In 1937 the CSP sent Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya on a speaking tour of the island.

The CSP had adopted Marxism in 1936 and their third conference in Faizpur they had formulated a thesis that directed the party to work to transform the Indian National Congress into an anti-imperialist front.

During the summer of 1938 a meeting took place between the Marxist sector of the Anushilan movement and the CSP. Present in the meeting were Jai Prakash Narayan (leader of CSP), Jogesh Chandra Chatterji, Tridib Kumar Chaudhuri and Keshav Prasad Sharma. The Anushilan marxists then held talks with Acharya Narendra Deva, a former Anushilan militant. The Anushilan marxists decided to join CSP, but keeping a separate identity within the party. With them came the Anushilan Samiti, not only the Marxist sector. The non-Marxists (who constituted about a half of the membership of the Samiti), although not ideologically attracted to the CSP, felt loyalty towards the Marxist sector. Moreover, around 25% of the membership of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association joined the CSP. This group was led by Jogesh Chandra Chatterji. The Anushilan marxists were however soon to be disappointed by developments inside the CSP. The party, at that the time Anushilan marxists had joined it, was not a homogeneous entity. There was the Marxist trend led by J.P. Narayan and Narendra Deva, the Fabian socialist trend led by Minoo Masani and Asoka Mehta and a Gandhian socialist trend led by Ram Manohar Lohia, and Achyut Patwardan. To the Anushilan marxists differences emerged between the ideological stands of the party and its politics in practice. These differences surfaced at the 1939 annual session of the Indian National Congress at Tripuri. At Tripuri, in the eyes of the Anushlian marxists, the CSP had failed to consistently defend Subhas Chandra Bose. Jogesh Chandra Chatterji renounced his CSP membership in protest against the action by the party leadership.

Soon after the Tripuri session, Bose resigned as Congress president and formed the Forward Bloc. The Forward Bloc was intended to function as a unifying force for all leftwing elements. The Forward Bloc held its first conference on 22–23 June 1939, and at the same time a Left Consolidation Committee consisting of the Forward Bloc, CPI, CSP, the Kisan Sabha, League of Radical Congressmen, Labour Party and the Anushilan marxists. At this moment, in October 1939, J.P. Narayan tried to stretch out an olive branch to the Anushilan marxists. He proposed the formation of a 'War Council' consisting of himself, Pratul Ganguly, Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee and Acharya Narendra Deva. But few days later, at a session of the All India Congress Committee, J.P. Narayan and the other CSP leaders pledged not to start any other movements parallel to those initiated by Gandhi. The Left Consolidation Committee soon fell into pieces, as the CPI, the CSP and the Royists deserted it. The Anushlian marxists left the CSP soon thereafter, forming the Revolutionary Socialist Party.

Narayan organized the CSP relief work in Kutch in 1939.

On the occasion of the 1940 Ramgarh Congress Conference CPI released a declaration called Proletarian Path, which sought to utilize the weakened state of the British Empire in the time of war and gave a call for general strike, no-tax, no-rent policies and mobilising for an armed revolution uprising. The National Executive of the CSP assembled at Ramgarh took a decision that all communists were expelled from CSP.

Members of the CSP were particularly active in the Quit India movement of August 1942. Although a socialist, Jawaharlal Nehru did not join the CSP, which created some rancor among CSP members who saw Nehru as unwilling to put his socialist slogans into action. After independence, the CSP broke away from Congress, under the influence of JP, and Lohia to form the Socialist Party of India.

title: Congress Socialist Party


text:
Talk:Northern Bank robbery

Loyalists
That loyalist intelligence comment, sums up very well the reasons why the PIRA were generally blamed dispite a lack of overall evidence. I'm readding the comment, as it is not POV it is not only factual (look at the casualty numbers) and the general opinion it conforms to the articles about the loyalist 'groups'. SCVirus 05:10, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I've added a police source for the assertion that loyalists weren't up to the task; can you find some opinion pieces mocking loyalist bungling? "Many commentators" is one of those dreaded weasel terms. Demiurge 11:21, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Latest developments
Demiurge, thanks for the cleanups - most welcome. I'm trying to ensure the wiki is kept reasonably up to date.

Bank note picture
That picture does seem rather pointless doesn't it? There must be something better than a picture of the banknote to put here. Funny little guy 05:15, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

British?
There seem to be a few references in the article about the Northern Bank Robber being in Britain ("...biggest bank robbery in British history"). Just to clarify, although Northern Ireland is part of the UK, it is not part of Great Britain, maybe this should be changed? Alex 20:16, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

 * I couldn't find any references to "Britain" in the article as it now stands. The quote you provide as an example doesn't refer to "Britain" either - it refers to a nationality. So, just to clarify, although Northern Ireland is not part of Great Britain, it is British and therefore the particular sentence you refer to does not need to be changed. -- Mal 12:06, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

 * British Isles (terminology) says "Britain = an informal term for Great Britain (in the political sense) and/or the United Kingdom." -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 20:22, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

The above is patently untrue. Britain can not be used as a term to describe the North of Ireland. It is not an "informal term" rather it is an incorrect term.It is one of many terms regularly used by the unionist community when referring to the six counties and it is as delusional as using ulster or province. No part of Ireland is of britain or is british regardless of the constitutional position. —Preceding unsigned comment added by User: (talk • contribs)

 * Please sign your comments. Britain doesn't describe either the "North of Ireland" nor Northern Ireland. The facts tend to speak for themselves: although Northern Ireland is not part of Britain, it is British. "The North of Ireland" is, by the way, one of those "delusional" terms, as is "the six counties". As for using the name Ulster to apply to the place, you should be reminded that its not only unionists or "the unionist community" that gets things technically wrong (see Saor Uladh for an example). While it is technically incorrect to refer to the UK as "Britain", as that basically exludes islands and Northern Ireland, it remains fact that it is used as a short form. -- Mal 12:06, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

 * British is a valid term being used to avoid an unneccesary use of words in what shouldn't be that much of a politically charged article, and one used by multiple media outlets in relation to the robbery -   . Note that this isn't a carte blanche for use in any other article, but I really don't see the problem in this one.  One Night In Hackney 303 15:49, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Introduction
I think this introduction is rather short. I've extended it, trying to keep an NPOV and avoiding weasal words. Just the sheer scale of the robbery deserves a note, and a brief mention of the massive political controversy surrounding it. martianlostinspace 21:16, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

And in hindsight, I see that "Lapsed Pacifist" seems to be the culprit who ripped out the previously even longer 2 paragraph introduction. I may/may not revert to this, but Passed Lassafist did not discuss this at any rate. martianlostinspace 21:27, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Not Bank of England
The haul included £10m of uncirculated Northern Bank sterling banknotes While they do have sterling written on them they are NOT sterling as these notes are not acceptable in the rest of the UK. (They are currency notes, accepted currency not legal tender.) 16:21, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I always assumed that Northern Irish bank notes were acceptable in the rest of the UK, they just arn't as people rarely see them. Phalanxia 19:54, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
 * They ARE Sterling banknotes, but that does not mean that they are universally accepted throughout the sterling zone. -- Arwel (talk) 20:54, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Notes printed in Northern Ireland ARE Stirling and ARE acceptable in the rest of the UK Dionysus99 11:31, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

 * Northern Irish notes are legal tender throughout the UK. Many may not accept them as they don't know them, but they are legally acceptable Sterling tender. Ben W Bell   talk  21:26, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

 * Incorrect. They are 110% not legal tender throughout the UK. One Night In Hackney  303  21:33, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

 * Oh no, not the "legal tender" red herring again. "Legal tender" does not mean what most people think it does - read the article for details. Northern Irish notes are not legal tender anywhere, neither are Scottish notes, and Bank of England notes are only legal tender in England and Wales. The acceptability of notes is an issue completely separate from "legal tender". -- Arwel (talk) 01:32, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:NorthernBankNI20.jpg
Image:NorthernBankNI20.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. — Save_Us   †  23:55, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

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Alleged coalition collapse never happened
When Gerry Adams denied that the IRA were involved in any way, this caused the Sinn Féin coalition with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) which was ruling Northern Ireland to collapse (this is referring to the killing in 2015, not the 2005 robbery)

Neither the Belfast Telegraph nor the Irish Times support that assertion. The UUP did withdraw from government and went into opposition, but as that article makes clear in order for the power-sharing government (the coalition referred to in the original sentence) to collapse the DUP would need to withdraw from government too (there can be no government in Northern Ireland without either nationalist or unionist representation). Peter Robinson did later resign (which threatened "to collapse the Northern Ireland assembly for the first time since 2007" as did several other DUP minister (triggering a lengthy in-out farce of resignations and reappointments), but Robinson was replaced by Arlene Foster and the Assembly continued until the 2016 Northern Ireland Assembly election. FDW777 (talk) 12:32, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

 * Thanks for pointing out the error, I've fixed it I hope, see what you think Mujinga (talk) 15:34, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

 * Much improved, although I'd be tempted to expand it slightly as it was a bigger political crisis than just the UUP, as it did involve the DUP first minister resigning. Obviously as it's ten years after the robbery and involving several degrees of separation this article doesn't need to go into the crisis in excruciating detail. FDW777 (talk) 19:22, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

 * Please feel free to add another sentence if you like. It is difficult knowing how much additional information to give in a case like this, since whilst it certainly is worth mentioning (as pointed out by the GA reviewer), having read into it a bit more I'm not sure how much the Davison murder was related to Northern Bank since McGuigan seems to have had a longstanding personal grudge against him. Mujinga (talk) 17:13, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

title: Talk:Northern Bank robbery


text:
Herbert Lewis

Sir John Herbert Lewis (27 December 1858 – 10 November 1933) was a Welsh Liberal Party politician.

Background and education
Born at Mostyn Quay, Flintshire, Lewis was the only child of Enoch Lewis and Catherine Roberts. It is possible that Lewis was related to C.S. Lewis. This speculation is the result of the fact that C.S. Lewis's grandfather, Richard Lewis, was born in Flintshire in 1775. He was educated at McGill University and Exeter College, Oxford.

Political career
Lewis was the first Chairman of Flintshire County Council. He was Member of Parliament MP for Flint Boroughs 1892–1906. In 1894, he resigned the Liberal Whip in the so-called 'Welsh Revolt', joining David Alfred Thomas, David Lloyd George and Frank Edwards. In a letter to T. E. Ellis, Lewis wrote to his friend, then Chief Whip: 'I will never again fight a constituency as an official Liberal.' Although he later recanted, this episode was illustrative of Herbert Lewis' moral seriousness. With Lloyd George, Lewis was an enthusiastic supporter of Cymru Fydd, a nationalist movement within Welsh Liberalism. Along with Lloyd George and David Alfred Thomas, he opposed the Boer War at the 1900 General Election. He was elected for Flintshire in 1906;

Lewis was a Lord of the Treasury, 1905–1908. He was re-elected twice in 1910, the second time unopposed;

Lewis was Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board, 1909–1915. He was Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education, 1915–1922, and played a key role in drawing up the Education Act 1918, often known as the Fisher Act. At the 1918 general election he contested the new University of Wales constituency as a Coalition Liberal;

He was offered a peerage on his retirement from Parliament in 1922, but declined the honour. He was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE) in the 1922 Dissolution Honours List.

Lewis was made a Privy Counsellor in 1912, a freeman of the towns of Flint and Aberystwyth, Constable of Flint Castle, honorary LL.D of the University of Wales in 1918. He was awarded the gold medal of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion in 1927.

Lewis was a keen supporter of the National Library of Wales, located in Aberystwyth. In 1909 he became a Vice President of the Library. In 1925, while walking in the hills above the town prior to a meeting of the Library's council, Lewis suffered a fall down a quarry which left him paralyzed for the rest of his life. Although elected President of the Library in 1926, this was a largely honorific appointment.

An active lay member of the Calvinistic Methodist Connexion, Lewis was elected Moderator of the denomination in 1925, although he declined the post. He was an interested correspondent in the trial for unorthodoxy of Thomas Williams (Tom Nefyn). Among his other correspondents in religious matters was the Welsh Revivalist Evan Roberts.

Personal life
Sir John Herbert Lewis was married twice, first in 1886 to Adelaide (d. 1895), daughter of Charles Hughes, publisher, Wrexham and in 1897 to Ruth, daughter of Alice and W. S. Caine, MP. By his second marriage he had a son and a daughter. He resided at Plas Penucha, Caerwys, Flintshire. Lewis died at his home, Plas Penucha, in 1933.

title: Herbert Lewis


text:
Talk:The Jazz Passengers

Notability

 * This band is important enough to have four records rated (positively) in the 1996 Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD; admittedly they were no longer present in the 2002 edition, probably because their records had gone out of print. Ferdinand Pienaar 21:34, 2005 Feb 19
 * Then be bold and give the article a discography section, rather than just talking about it on the talk page. The notices do say to "expand the article". Uncle G 01:21, 2005 Feb 20 (UTC)
 * At least as notable as the List of Bart Simpson's pets, or Star Trek characters who have been mentioned on South Park... Ferdinand Pienaar 21:34, 2005 Feb 19
 * That argument doesn't wash, for many reasons, too long to go into here (see past WP:VFD discussions). In any case, it's irrelevant.  WikiProject Music has a set of specific guidelines for bands, singers, and suchlike.  Since it does, other standards for completely different articles on completely different topics are only of secondary importance. Uncle G 01:21, 2005 Feb 20 (UTC)

Vfd
On April 8, 2005, this article was nominated for deletion. The result was keep. See Votes for deletion/The Jazz Passengers for a record of the discussion. —Korath (Talk) 01:20, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

title: Talk:The Jazz Passengers


text:
Talk:Stari Jankovci

Stari Jankovci

 * Very short article with little or no context Preisler 21:34, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Now it's a geo-stub, and the two names (which seem to be vanity) are removed. andy 22:06, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

title: Talk:Stari Jankovci


text:
Dominick Argento

Dominick Argento (October 27, 1927 – February 20, 2019) was an American composer known for his lyric operatic and choral music. Among his best known pieces are the operas Postcard from Morocco, Miss Havisham's Fire, The Masque of Angels, and The Aspern Papers. He also is known for the song cycles Six Elizabethan Songs and From the Diary of Virginia Woolf; the latter earned him the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1975. In a predominantly tonal context, his music freely combines tonality, atonality and a lyrical use of twelve-tone writing. None of Argento's music approaches the experimental, stringent avant-garde fashions of the post-World War II era.

As a student in the 1950s, Argento divided his time between the United States and Italy, and his music is greatly influenced by both his instructors in the United States and his personal affection for Italy, particularly the city of Florence. Many of Argento's works were written in Florence, where he spent a portion of every year. He was a professor at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. He frequently remarked that he found residents of that city to be tremendously supportive of his work and thought his musical development would have been impeded had he stayed in the high-pressure world of East Coast music. He was one of the founders of the Center Opera Company (now the Minnesota Opera). Newsweek magazine once referred to the Twin Cities as "Argento's town."

Argento wrote fourteen operas, in addition to major song cycles, orchestral works, and many choral pieces for small and large forces. Many of these were commissioned for and premiered by Minnesota-based artists. He referred to his wife, the soprano Carolyn Bailey, as his muse, and she frequently performed his works. Bailey died on February 2, 2006.

In 2009, Argento was awarded the Brock Commission from the American Choral Directors Association.

Early life and education
The son of Sicilian immigrants, Argento was born and grew up in York, Pennsylvania. He found his music classes in elementary school to be "fifty-minute sessions of excruciating boredom". Upon graduating from high school, he was drafted into the Army and worked for a period as a cryptographer. Following the war and using funding from the G.I. Bill, he began studying piano performance at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore. He quickly decided to switch to composition.

He earned bachelor's (1951) and master's (1953) degrees from Peabody, where his teachers included Nicolas Nabokov, Henry Cowell, and Hugo Weisgall. While there, he was briefly the music director of the Hilltop Musical Company, which Weisgall founded as a sort of answer to Benjamin Britten's festival at Aldeburgh—a venue for local composers (particularly Weisgall) to present new work. Argento gained broad exposure to and experience in the world of new opera. Hilltop's stage director was the writer John Olon-Scrymgeour, with whom Argento later collaborated on many operas. During this period, he also spent a year in Florence on a scholarship of the U.S.-Italy Fulbright Commission. He has called the experience "life-altering;" while there, he studied briefly with Luigi Dallapiccola.

Argento continued graduate studies and received his Ph.D. from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied with Alan Hovhaness, Bernard Rogers and Howard Hanson. Following completion of this degree, he received a Guggenheim Fellowship to study/work for another year in Florence. He established a tradition of spending long periods of time in that city.

Minnesota years
Argento moved to Minneapolis in 1958 with his new wife, soprano Carolyn Bailey, to begin teaching theory and composition at the University of Minnesota. His students there included composers Philip Brunelle, Juliana Hall, Libby Larsen, Stephen Paulus, and Marjorie Rusche. Within a few years, he received commissions from virtually every major performing group there. He has remarked that this constant feeling of strong community interest in his work made him feel particularly at home in Minnesota, although he had at first resisted moving there. For several years, he hoped to find a position on his native East Coast.

Argento became involved in writing music for productions at the then-new Guthrie Theater. In 1963, he and Scrymgeour founded the Center Opera Company, which later became the Minnesota Opera, to be in residence at the Guthrie. Argento composed the short opera The Masque of Angels for the occasion as the first Performing Arts commission of the Walker Art Center. This work—with its complex harmonic language and an emphasis on expansive choral writing that prefigures his later role as a prominent choral composer—firmly established his local prominence, as well as providing a role for his wife.

By 1971, when his daring, surreal opera Postcard from Morocco opened at Center Opera, Argento's national reputation was secure, in part thanks to a glowing review by the principal music critic of The New York Times. He eventually received commissions from New York City Opera, the newly formed Minnesota Opera, Washington Opera, and the Baltimore and St. Louis symphonies, among others. Argento also developed close professional relationships with several prominent singers, notably Frederica von Stade, Janet Baker, and Håkan Hagegård, tailoring some of his best-known song cycles to their talents.

Choral prominence and later life
In the mid-1970s, Argento began writing choral works for the choir of Plymouth Congregational Church in Minneapolis, which his friend Philip Brunelle directed. The partnership with Brunelle was particularly fruitful, yielding commissions and premieres at Plymouth Church and at the Minnesota Opera, where Brunelle was Music Director. In this period Argento composed Jonah and the Whale (1973), co-commissioned by Plymouth Congregational Church and the Cathedral of St. Mark-Episcopal. He began to receive larger commissions for choral works, eventually composing major pieces for the Dale Warland Singers, The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Buffalo Schola Cantorum, and the Harvard and Yale glee clubs.

The recording by Frederica von Stade and the Minnesota Orchestra of his song cycle Casa Guidi won the 2004 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition. Argento's book Catalogue Raisonné as Memoir, an autobiographical discussion of his works, was published in 2004.

Argento retired from teaching but retained the title of Professor Emeritus at the University of Minnesota until his death. He lived in Minneapolis. The world premiere of Evensong: Of Love and Angels was presented by the Cathedral Choral Society in March 2008 at Washington National Cathedral. The work was written in memory of his late wife and in honor of the centennial of the Washington National Cathedral. In July 2014, the choral cycle "Seasons," setting texts by friend Pat Solstad, was premiered by the Minnesota Beethoven Festival Chorale in Winona, Minnesota, under the direction of longtime friend Dale Warland.

Argento died at his home in Minneapolis in 2019.

Operas
Argento's operatic output is eclectic and extensive. He withdrew two early operas, written while he was a student—Sicilian Limes and Colonel Jonathan the Saint. The Boor, written in 1957 as part of his Ph.D. work, was published by Boosey & Hawkes and performed in 2017. He collaborated with John Olon-Scrymgeour on a number of works, including The Masque of Angels; Christopher Sly (1962), based on an episode from The Taming of the Shrew; and The Shoemaker's Holiday, (1967) a "ballad opera" based on a play by Thomas Dekker.

After the success of Postcard from Morocco in 1971, which had a libretto by Jon Donahue, he received much larger commissions. The University of Minnesota and Minnesota Opera together commissioned The Voyage of Edgar Allan Poe in 1975-76, with a libretto by Charles Nolte. As a result of that work, which received wildly enthusiastic reviews, the New York City Opera commissioned him. He composed Miss Havisham's Fire (1977), with a libretto by Scrymgeour. It was not initially well-received, and Argento revised it into a one-act monodrama, Miss Havisham's Wedding Night, which the Minnesota Opera premiered on May 1, 1981, at the Tyrone Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, conducted by Philip Brunelle. He revised Miss Havisham's Fire in 1995 and it has been successfully revived and performed since.

In 1984, the Minnesota Opera commissioned Casanova's Homecoming, with text by the composer; it went on to a well-received run at New York City Opera. At the insistence of Beverly Sills, then the company's musical director, the opera was the first in New York City to be performed in English with English supertitles. She wanted to ensure that the audience understood all the jokes. The opera won the 1986 National Institute for Music Theatre Award.

Argento next composed The Aspern Papers (1987) as a vehicle for Frederica von Stade, with his own libretto adapted from the 1888 novella by Henry James. His next opera and arguably largest work to date was The Dream of Valentino, which premiered at the Kennedy Center in 1993. Critic Anne Midgette of The New York Times has noted that Argento's operas tend to be very well received upon their premieres but lack an "easy popular hook" and are rarely revived.

Song cycles and "monodramas"
Argento's song cycles are notable for his frequent use of dramatic, unusual text, most often prose that does not have immediately apparent musical possibilities. His works blur the distinction between straightforward groupings of songs and dramatic works, which he terms "monodramas". His best-known song cycle is From the Diary of Virginia Woolf, with a text he assembled from the book of that title. Written for Janet Baker in 1974, it won the Pulitzer Prize for Music and is performed frequently.

Other prominent works in a similar vein include Letters from Composers (1968), which uses as its text letters written by Chopin, Puccini, and others; Casa Guidi (1983), which sets letters written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning; and A Few Words About Chekhov (1996), which adapts letters by Anton Chekhov.

Argento's other song cycles are highly varied: One of the few major song cycles Argento has written that use "traditional" verse as a text is his popular Six Elizabethan Songs. Other solo vocal works by Argento include:
 * A Water Bird Talk (1974–76) is a one-act monodrama adapted from Chekhov's "On the Harmful Effects of Tobacco," with images and passages from John James Audubon's Birds of America;
 * The Andrée Expedition (1980) includes journal entries made by Swedish balloonist Salomon Andrée and excerpts from a personal diary and letters of his companion Nils Strindberg during their failed three-man expedition in 1897 to the North Pole by hydrogen balloon; and
 * Miss Manners on Music (1998) sets to music newspaper clippings by American 20th-century advice columnist Judith Martin (aka "Miss Manners").
 * Songs About Spring (1950–55), text by E. E. Cummings, for voice and piano
 * Ode to the West Wind (1956), text by Percy Bysshe Shelley, for soprano and orchestra
 * To Be Sung Upon the Water (1972), text by William Wordsworth, for voice, clarinet and piano
 * The Bremen Town Musicians (1998), text by the composer, a "children's entertainment" with narrator and orchestra

Major choral works
Argento's The Masque of Angels (1963) has sections, such as the "Gloria" and "Sanctus", that are frequently excerpted and performed separately. His next major choral work was The Revelation of St. John the Divine (1968), which sets portions of the Book of Revelation from the Bible; it is scored for male chorus, brass, and an array of percussion instruments.

Peter Quince at the Clavier (1979), a setting of the poem by Wallace Stevens, was commissioned by Pennsylvania State University in honor of the state's tercentenary (both Stevens and Argento are Pennsylvania natives). For the Dale Warland Singers, Argento wrote I Hate and I Love (1981), with text by Catullus, and Walden Pond (1996), based on excerpts from Thoreau.

In 1987 Argento composed a massive Te Deum that integrates the Latin text with medieval English folk poetry. A Toccata of Galuppi's (1989), a 20-minute setting of a Robert Browning poem, is one of many works inspired by Argento's time in Florence. In 2008, the Harvard Glee Club premiered his Apollo in Cambridge, a multi-movement setting of texts by Harvard-affiliated writers of the 19th century.

Other choral works by Argento include:
 * A Nation of Cowslips (1968), seven bagatelles on nonsense text by Keats
 * Tria Carmina Pasachalia (1970), an Easter cantata for women's chorus
 * Jonah and the Whale (1973), a large-scale oratorio on medieval English texts
 * Spirituals and Swedish Chorales (1994)
 * Walden Pond: Nocturnes and Barcarolles (1997, SATB choir, 3 cellos, harp)
 * Dover Beach Revisited (2003), refers to the poem "Dover Beach" written by Victorian Matthew Arnold; Argento's work was composed for the Yale Glee Club
 * Four Seascapes (2004); words of Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Henry James, and Thornton Wilder set to music
 * Numerous anthems for choir and organ and a cappella motets
 * Evensong: Of Love and Angels (2008, full orchestra, SSAATTBB choir, two soprano soloists)
 * Seasons (2014, SATB choir a cappella)

Orchestral works
Argento's non-vocal output is relatively small; there are no symphonies and just one string quartet, written when he was a student. He produced numerous orchestral suites based on his operas, including Le tombeau d'Edgar Poe (1985), adapted from The Voyage of Edgar Allan Poe, and the popular Valentino Dances (1994), from The Dream of Valentino. He wrote two ballets that were fashioned into orchestral suites, The Resurrection of Don Juan (1956) and Royal Invitation (Homage to the Queen of Tonga) (1964). His 1982 Fire Variations was nominated for the Kennedy Center's Friedheim Award in Music.

Other orchestral works include:
 * Divertimento (1954) for piano and strings
 * Variations for Orchestra (The Mask of Night) (1965)
 * Bravo Mozart (1969), an "imaginary biography"
 * A Ring of Time (1972) for orchestra and bells
 * In Praise of Music (1977), a set of "songs" for orchestra
 * Capriccio ‘Rossini in Paris’ (1985), essentially a clarinet concerto
 * Reverie (Reflections on a Hymn Tune) (1997)
 * Other small works for chamber groups of instruments

Discography

 * In Praise of Music (1977), with the Minnesota Orchestra, conducted by Eiji Oue, Reference Recordings, 2002
 * Casa Guidi (1983), with Frederica von Stade and the Minnesota Orchestra, conducted by Eiji Oue, Reference Recordings, 2002
 * Capriccio for Clarinet and Orchestra (1986), with Burt Hara and the Minnesota Orchestra, conducted by Eiji Oue, Reference Recordings, 2002
 * Dominick Argento: Three Works; Odyssey Opera of Boston, Studio Recording, released in 2019 - The Boor, Miss Havisham’s Wedding Night, A Water Bird Talk, conducted by Gil Rose
 * Walden Pond (1997), The Dale Warland Singers, Gothic Records, 2003

title: Dominick Argento


text:
Talk:Vince McMahon

 Please note that this talk page is for discussion of changes to the Vince McMahon article. Off-topic discussions are not appropriate for Wikipedia and will be removed. Thank you for your cooperation.

Semi-protected edit request on 27 January 2024
In the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vince_McMahon#Sexual_misconduct_allegations section there is a note that says "The WWE/UFC talent in question was not named in the lawsuit, but was identified by The Wall Street Journal as Brock Lesnar." but this has no source. please can it be removed? 86.188.76.220 (talk) 14:41, 27 January 2024 (UTC)
 * ❌ The source is the WSJ article cited at the end of the paragraph. I think this is reasonably obvious. Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:41, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Add subsections about the 1990s ring boy scandal and Ashley Massaro's claims that Vince preyed on female wrestlers to the Sexual misconduct allegations section
These seem to be two major omissions to this article. They are both extensively covered by these two credible sources https://www.businessinsider.in/politics/world/news/wwe-cofounder-linda-mcmahon-who-runs-trumps-biggest-super-pac-once-hired-a-suspected-child-molester-on-the-condition-that-he-stop-chasing-after-kids-he-didnt-/articleshow/78938854.cms and https://www.vice.com/en/article/epv78z/ashley-massaro-wwe-vince-mcmahon-sexual-divas 72.28.39.77 (talk) 23:18, 9 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Done. Mt.FijiBoiz (talk) 22:45, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

UNDUE content
There seem to be sexual abuse allegations on this article that are only tangentially related to the article subject, and are thus WP:UNDUE. For example: Vince_McMahon and Vince_McMahon. These probably should only be on the WWE article. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:22, 17 July 2024 (UTC) I have now removed the content from the article as no response to my initial question. WP:BLPRESTORE applies to this type of content, find consensus here before re-adding. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:48, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

1990s ring boy scandal
During the early 1990s, Mel Phillips, WWF's ring announcer and ring crew head, was accused of molesting multiple "ring boys", under-aged children that worked as part of the WWF ring crew. In 1992, Phillips was fired from the WWF. Phillips had previously been temporarily dismissed from the WWF in 1988 for sexual misconduct, but was brought back that same year.

On October 29, 2020, it was reported by Business Insider that Vince McMahon and his wife Linda were aware of the allegations against Phillips but willfully turned a blind eye to them. According to Freedom of Information Act requests for court records regarding the ring boy scandal, Vince, under oath, stated that he was aware that Phillips had taken a "peculiar and unnatural interest in children" but refused to take action against him. Further testimony revealed that Vince, after bringing Phillips back to the WWF in 1988, had made Phillips promise to "stop chasing after kids". It was also reported by Business Insider that, under Vince and Linda McMahon's directive, the WWF began a campaign to discredit Tom Cole, one of the children who had accused Phillips of sexual misconduct, and Cole's family. In response to the Business Insider report, Jerry McDevitt, WWE's attorney, stated that the accusations against Phillips were related to his unusual "foot fetish" but did not include "anything approximating conventional forms of sexual abuse such as rape, sodomy, etc." He additionally described the claims that the McMahons knew about the accusations against Phillips but refused to take action and continued to employ him under the condition that he "stop chasing after kids" as "outlandish" and "classic libel."

Tom Cole died in February 2021.

Ashley Massaro
Prior to her death on May 15, 2019, former WWE wrestler Ashley Massaro alleged that she was sexually assaulted at a US military base during a 2006 WWE tour of Kuwait by a man posing as a doctor, and that WWE officials persuaded her to not report it to the appropriate authorities as they did not want it to affect the company's relationship with the military. WWE officials would later claim they had no knowledge of Massaro's alleged sexual assault.

After her death, an affidavit by Massaro describing the sexual assault allegations in detail was subsequently released by the law firm that represented her. In response, WWE said that their executives had not been previously informed of the allegations described in the affidavit. Despite previous denials from WWE about having knowledge of her allegation, in February 2024 an attorney representing former WWE Head of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis stated that: "most upper level management at sometime became aware of the [Massaro] allegations and ensured all proper WWE protocols were followed, including privacy for the alleged victim." That month, Vice News reported that the Naval Criminal Investigative Service had investigated Massaro's allegations from June 2019 to January 2020, although no further information about the investigation other than its existence is known. A further report by Vice News revealed that Massaro had accused Vince McMahon of "preying on female WWE wrestlers" and that she believed he had tried to sabotage her wrestling career after she rejected an advance from him.

title: Talk:Vince McMahon


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Abril

 This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record. The result of the debate was delete. -- AllyUnion (talk) 15:59, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Abril
Non-notable amateur comic. Delete. --BM 21:37, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. By themselves, works by amateur comic-book artists do not seem notable. It needs more notable evidence.
 * Unsigned by Zzyzx11.
 * Delete, non-notable, likely vanity. Articl does not establish notability, and indeed describes itself as "non-profitable" by an "amateur". —Korath (Talk) 17:39, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.

title: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Abril


text:
Orchestra Baobab

Orchestra Baobab is a Senegalese band established in 1970 as the house band of the Baobab Club in Dakar. Many of the band's original members had previously played with Star Band de Dakar in the 1960s. Directed by timbalero and vocalist Balla Sidibé, the group featured saxophonists Issa Cissoko and Thierno Koité, two singers, two guitarists and a rhythm section with drums, congas and bass guitar. Since their formation, the band has predominantly played a mix of son cubano, Wolof music, and to a lesser extent Mande musical traditions. Following the deaths of Cissoko in 2019 and Sidibé in 2020, Thierno Koité has become the leader of the band.

Orchestra Baobab became one of the dominant African bands of the 1970s, recording 20 albums before their breakup in 1987, which occurred as a result of the increase in popularity of mbalax, a more contemporary genre of Senegalese music. In the years following their disbandment, World Circuit released several of their albums on CD, making the band very popular among world music fans in the UK and the rest of Europe. This prompted their reformation in 2001, which was followed by the recording of a new album, Specialist in All Styles. The group continues to tour extensively and has released two more studio albums, Made in Dakar (2007) and Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng (2017).

Early years: 1970–1972
Many of the original members were veterans of the famous Star Band, whose alumni later included the Étoile de Dakar, El Hadji Faye and Youssou N’Dour. Star Band were the resident band of the upscale Dakar Miami Club. When the Baobab Club opened in Dakar in 1970, six musicians, led by saxophonist Baro N'Diaye, were lured from Star Band and the Orchestra Baobab was born. The club, in turn, is named for the baobab tree (Adansonia).

The original frontmen of the band were the Casamance singers Balla Sidibé and Rudy Gomis, who came from the melting pot of Casamance musical styles, and most famously Laye M'Boup, who provided vocals in the Wolof griot style. His Wolof language lyrics and his soaring, nasal voice defined the sound of Baobab's early hits. Togolese guitarist and arranger Barthélémy Attisso was a law student in Dakar, and a self-taught musician, whose arpeggiated runs became instantly recognizable. With the saxophone of Baro N'Diaye, this was the first core of the band. After touring Cameroon in 1971, N'Diaye was replaced by tenor saxophonist Issa Cissoko, who became leader of the band, and was joined by clarinettist Peter Udo. Both Cissoko and drummer Mountaga Koité were from Maninka griot families, from Mali and eastern Senegal, respectively. The group's lineup was rounded out by the slow groove Latin styles of Latfi Benjeloum (rhythm guitar), who came from a Moroccan family exiled to Saint-Louis, Senegal, and Charlie N'Diaye (bass) from Casamance.

The group's first recordings were released as Orchestre Saf Mounadem on a split album with Orchestre Laye Thiam, another band of ex-Star Band musicians. Attisso is credited as musical director, and singers Balla Sidibé and Medoune Diallo (who had stayed with the Star Band a bit longer than the others), along with Issa Cissoko are also credited on the cover. Like most of the recordings by Star Band, the album was produced by Ibrahim Kassé, and was later reissued in France under the title Star Band de Dakar Vol. 7.

Their first two albums under the name Orchestra Baobab, were recorded at the Baobab Club between 1970 and 1972, and self-produced by the band. Both bear the title Orchestre du Baobab.

Rise to fame: 1973–1978
The band continued to tour throughout Africa, popularising their combination of Afro-Cuban music and Senegalese traditions. Unlike other bands from the country, they combined the Casamance harmonies and drumming from southern Senegal with melodies from Togo and Morocco to the Wolof tradition from northern Senegal. Traditional Wolof singing was provided by Laye M´Boup until his death in June 1975. He was replaced by Ndiouga Dieng, who stayed with the band until his own death in 2016. In 1974, an 18-year old singer joined the band on recommendation of M'Boup himself: Thione Seck, who later achieved great success as a solo artist when he left the band in 1979. His younger brother Mapenda Seck also provided vocals occasionally after the death of M'Boup. Most of the Spanish-language hits by the band were sung by Medoune Diallo, whose mother tongue was Fula.

With the independent Dakar-based label Buur Records, run by the owners of the Baobab Club, the group released five albums between 1975 and 1976: Bawobab 75, Guy Gu Rey Gi, Senegaal Sunugaal, Visage du Senegaal and Adduna jarul naawo.

Looking for success beyond the African continent, Orchestra Baobab went to Paris in 1978 to record new material with producer Abou Sylla. The resulting two LPs, On verra ça and Africa 78, although receiving great critical acclaim retrospectively, did not prove successful. The group lost money on the trip and returned to Senegal. They recorded two albums, released by Musicafrique: Ndeleng Ndeleng and Une nuit au Jandeer.

Club closure and new recordings: 1979–1982
By the end of the 1970s, the band concluded its residency at the Baobab Club, which closed its doors in 1979. At this point, they were Senegal's biggest band, "commanding fees of about $4,500 for a single show." In the early 1980s, with the advent of the cassette, the group began releasing albums in this format. Their 1981 albums Mouhamadou Bamba and Sibou odia extended their success into the new decade, helped by their hit "Autorail", composed by Medoune Diallo.

In 1982, they recorded enough material for several cassettes (Vol. 1: Senegambie, Vol. 2: Ngalam), as well as an LP, Ken dow werente. Among the songs recorded for these sessions was "Utru horas", which was included in the various artists compilation Panorama du Senegal.

Decline and disbandment: 1983–1987
As the 1980s progressed, competition from mbalax, a new funk-inspired genre spearheaded by Youssou N'Dour's Super Étoile de Dakar, overwhelmed Orchestra Baobab. Although bandleader Balla Sidibé tried to make some changes in the mid-1980s by including two female singers in their lineup and getting Rudy Gomis back as lead singer, their popularity had been significantly reduced. Their 1986 cassette releases did not have the impact of previous albums and in 1987 the band effectively broke up. Many of the members formed or joined other groups, and Barthélémy Attisso returned to Togo to practice law and stopped playing his instrument.

European reissues: 1989–1999
By the end of the 1980s, world music had become one of the newest trends in the European and American music industry, with albums such as Paul Simon's Graceland selling millions of copies. This prompted specialized music labels to seek African recordings and reissue them on CD. One of such labels, World Circuit, run from London by Nick Gold, released Orchestra Baobab's 1982 sessions in 1989 under the title Pirate's Choice, a reference to the many bootleg releases of such songs.

In 1992, World Circuit reissued the 1978 Paris sessions on one CD, and in 1993 Stern's Music, another London-based world music label, released Bamba, a compilation of the band's 1981 albums. In 1998, the band's debut album, along with several bonus tracks recorded between 1970 and 1971, were released in the Netherlands as N'Wolof. In 1999, the German label Popular African Music released Roots and Fruit, a compilation of the band's 1970s recordings.

Specialist in All Styles
Following the widespread critical acclaim received by the band's European releases, World Circuit persuaded the group to reform in 2001. Most of the original line up reunited to play London's Barbican Centre in May 2001. Afterwards, the band re-recorded many of their classic songs in state-of-the-art studios in London (Livingston Studios), Paris (Studio Davout) and Dakar (Studio Xippi). The resulting album, Specialist in All Styles, was released in 2002. It was produced by Youssou N'Dour and featured a guest appearance by Cuban singer Ibrahim Ferrer alongside N'Dour himself. Ferrer had been retired for decades before the 1996 recording of the Buena Vista Social Club album, organised and produced by Nick Gold. The release of the album was accompanied by a world tour, which included performances on TV such as their appearance on Later... with Jools Holland in October 2002.

Orchestra Baobab gained attention from American media in 2003 when musicians Trey Anastasio and Dave Matthews filmed a documentary named Trey and Dave go to Africa which aired on VH1. The two visited Senegal and performed with Orchestra Baobab during the program. They performed again together on the Late Show with David Letterman in May 2004. In July 2005, Orchestra Baobab performed at Live 8 in Johannesburg, a series of concerts to raise awareness and funds to end poverty.

Made in Dakar
In October 2007, Orchestra Baobab released the album Made in Dakar on World Circuit to critical acclaim. The album contains new recordings of some of their classic songs such as "Pape Ndiaye" and "Nijaay". In May 2009, Syllart released La Belle Époque, a compilation of the band's 1970s recordings, including several previously unreleased songs. The package included a biography by Radio France Internationale journalist Pierre René-Worms, focusing on the early years before the group split. CD 1 comprises recordings made at Club Baobab, Dakar, in 1971, 1973 and 1976, while CD 2 includes their 1978 Paris sessions. A second volume was released in 2011, featuring recordings made between 1973 and 1976.

Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng
Ten years on from their previous release, after the retirement of Attisso, the departure of Benjeloun and the death of Ndiouga Dieng in November 2016, Orchestra Baobab continue to tour and record new material. Dieng was replaced by his son, Alpha Dieng. Under Balla Sidibé's leadership, they released Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng on 31 March 2017. The album features Beninese guitarist René Sowatche as Attisso's replacement and, for the first time, the band incorporates a kora player, Abdoulaye Cissoko. There are also appearances of ex-member Thione Seck and popular singer Cheikh Lô. The album release was accompanied by a world tour with concerts in played in the UK, France and Norway.

As the band approached its 50th anniversary, its key members passed away. Issa Cissoko died in March 2019 at the age of 72, while Balla Sidibé died in July 2020, aged 78. Despite the loss of both of its leaders, Orchestra Baobab decided to continue, with longtime saxophonist Thierno Koité as its new director. Former lead singer Thione Seck (aged 66) and former guitarist Barthélémy Attisso (aged 76) both died in 2021. Rudy Gomis suffered from severe meningitis in October 2016 and went into a coma. He fully recovered in 2020, but died at the age of 75 in April 2022.

Awards
After being separated for 15 years Orchestra Baobab reunited in 2001. The reunited group went on to win the award for best African artists and the critics' choice award at the 2003 BBC Radio 3 World Music Awards. The group won both awards for Specialist in All Styles, their first album since their split in 1987. In winning the Best African Artists award Orchestra Baobab beat the African musicians Kassé Mady Diabaté and Tony Allen.

Discography
This list includes all the studio albums by Orchestra Baobab, with label information to identify the original issues. As usual in Africa, most cassettes were released with no label or catalog number.

 * Orchestre Laye Thiam / Orchestre Saf Mounadem (1970, Ibrahim Kassé 3026)
 * Orchestre du Baobab (1971, Baobab BAO 1)
 * Orchestre du Baobab (1972, Baobab BAO 2)
 * Orchestre Baobab '75' (1975, Buur BRLP 001)
 * Guy Gu Rey Gi (1975, Buur BRLP 002)
 * Senegaal sunugaal (1975, Buur BRLP 003)
 * Visage du Senegal (1975, Buur BRLP 004)
 * Aduna jarul naawoo (1976, Buur BRLP 005)
 * N'Deleng N'Deleng (1977, Musicafrique MSCLP 001)
 * Une nuit au Jandeer (1978, Musicafrique MSCLP 002)
 * Baobab à Paris Vol. 1: On verra ça (1978, Ledoux ASL 7001)
 * Baobab à Paris Vol. 2: Africa 78 (1978, Ledoux ASL 7002)
 * Mohamadou Bamba (1981, Jambaar JM 5000)
 * Sibou odia (1981, Jambaar JM 5004)
 * Vol. 1: Senegambie (1982)
 * Vol. 2: Ngalam (1982)
 * Ken Dou Werente (1982, MCA 307)
 * Vol. 3: Coumba Ndiaye (1986)
 * Mame Diarra Bousso (1986)
 * Yamdoulene (1986)
 * Nouvelle formation (1986, Syllart SYL 83105)
 * Specialist in All Styles (2002, World Circuit WCD 064)
 * Made in Dakar (2007, World Circuit WCD 078)
 * Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng (2017, World Circuit WCD 092)

Compilations

 * Gouygui dou daanou (1979, Discafrique DARL 001) – reissue of 1978 Paris sessions
 * Hommage à Laye M'Boup (1982, Bellot 3806)
 * Pirates Choice (1989, World Circuit WCD 014) – reissue of 1982 sessions
 * On verra ça: The 1978 Paris Sessions (1992, World Circuit WCD 027) – reissue of 1978 Paris sessions
 * Bamba (1993, Stern's STCD 3003) – reissue of 1980–81 sessions
 * N'Wolof (1998, Dakar Sound 014) – reissue of 1970–71 sessions
 * Roots and Fruit (1999, Popular African Music 304)
 * Pirates Choice (2001, World Circuit WCD 063) – double CD edition
 * A Night at Club Baobab (2006, Oriki ORK 001)
 * Classics Titles (2006, Cantos)
 * La Belle Époque (2009, Syllart 361)
 * La Belle Époque Vol. 2 (2011, Syllart 990)

title: Orchestra Baobab


text:
Charlie Hodgson

Charles Christopher Hodgson (born 12 November 1980) is a retired English rugby union player, having previously been a player for Sale Sharks and Saracens. His position was fly-half and he is the leading Premiership points scorer of all time. Hodgson also played for England, until announcing his international retirement in 2012. Hodgson made 18 consecutive starts at fly half for England between 2004 and 2006.

Early years
Born on 12 November 1980 in Halifax, West Yorkshire, Hodgson was educated at Bradford Grammar School; the school hosts a rugby tournament for under-12s called the Charlie Hodgson Cup. He was a huge Halifax rugby league fan long before he ever played rugby union. A family friend invited him to Old Brodleians rugby club and his first game was for the opposition, as they were short. He has also played for Old Brodleians, Durham University and Yorkshire. He was first picked for Yorkshire by Keith Dyas.

International
He marked his England début with a record-breaking 44-point haul against Romania in November 2001, the most by any England player in a test match, when England won 134–0.

He was selected at centre in the 2003 Six Nations. He played 2 games at centre, only to be demoted to the subs bench for the third match against Italy. It was in this game he picked up a serious injury. He made a return to action during the 2003/04 season, after having been sidelined for eight months with a ruptured cruciate ligament in his left knee. The injury had denied him selection for the 2003 World Cup and another injury kept him out of the 2004 Six Nations. He played at fly-half during the 2004 summer tour to the Southern Hemisphere, for all three internationals against New Zealand and Australia. He was named Man of the Match against Canada in the Autumn of that year.

Hodgson has received criticism for not being Jonny Wilkinson and his inconsistent goal kicking, which was partly responsible for England's disappointing performance in the 2005 Six Nations championship.

Hodgson was selected for the 2005 British & Irish Lions tour of New Zealand.

Whilst playing for England against South Africa on 18 November 2006, Hodgson ruptured the cruciate ligament in his right knee that ensured he would miss the rest of the 2006/07 season. Subsequently, he did not appear for England throughout the whole of 2007, missing the 2007 Rugby World Cup through injury, just as he had in 2003. Hodgson made his return to the England squad for the 2008 Six Nations Championship. Hodgson was dropped during England's tour of New Zealand in 2008 as he was perceived to have a weak defence.

After two years away from the international side, Hodgson was selected to play for England in May 2010. During his time away from the England set-up, Hodgson had improved his defence enough to impress the new coach, Martin Johnson.

Hodgson was selected for England's June tour of New Zealand. He was selected at fly-half for the first test but was subbed early in the second half because of some defensive errors most notably the missed tackle on centre Ma'a Nonu which led to a try. He took no further part in the tour. Hodgson's next game for England was against the Barbarians on 29 May 2010 however he was substituted in the first half due to a facial injury. Hodgson was included in Johnson's squad to tour Australia in June 2010, although he did not play in the Tests.

Although not originally in England's squad for the 2010 autumn internationals, Hodgson was called up as cover after Wilkinson suffered a shoulder injury. In England's 21–11 defeat to South Africa Hodgson sustained what was thought to be a bruised foot; however, it was later discovered that the suspected bruise was a broken foot. In June 2012, Hodgson announced his retirement from international Rugby.

Club career
Hodgson first played for Sale Sharks against French club Auch in 2000. Sale Sharks is where Hodgson has seen his greatest success in winning the 2005/06 Guinness Premiership in a dominant victory over Leicester Tigers at Twickenham. In the final he contributed 6 penalties, a conversion and a drop goal. Hodgson has been voted Sale Sharks player of the season three times: 2008, 2009, and 2010.

In an attempt to correct a long-standing shoulder problem, Hodgson underwent surgery in August 2010. Although he missed the start of the 2010/11 season, he recovered to take his place in Sale's team in September. He returned from injury on 2 January 2011, taking part in Sale's 28–22 win against Saracens.

Just over a week later, Hodgson signed a three-year contract with Saracens, stating that he wanted a "new challenge". Sale's chief executive, Mick Hogan, paid tribute to Hodgson, saying that "Without doubt, he will be considered among the greatest players to ever play for Sale Sharks". Towards the end of the seasons, in April, Hodgson scored his 1,000th point at Edgeley Park. He passed the landmark in a match against Gloucester; Hodgson assumed the role of captain for the game and victory helped Sale avoid relegation. During his time at Saracens he won two Premiership titles in 2015 and 2016, as a replacement in both finals. He also helped Saracens win the European Champions Cup in 2016, again as a replacement in the final. In 2016, Hodgson Announced his retirement from rugby union.

Private life
On 23 June 2007, Hodgson married Daisy Hartley at Bolton Abbey in Yorkshire. The couple have five children.

title: Charlie Hodgson


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/St Dominic Dragons

 This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record. The result of the debate was delete. -- AllyUnion (talk) 16:05, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

St Dominic Dragons
6th best calothic (sic) school basketball team in Western New York. Not notable Preisler 21:43, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. "They were awarded the rank of 6th best calothic school basketball team in Western New York" is not notable. Zzyzx11 00:26, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete, not notable, possible team vanity. Megan1967 01:53, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.