text:
Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl Cowley

Garret Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl of Cowley (born 30 March 1965), styled Viscount Dangan from 1975 to 2016, is a British hereditary peer and businessman. Previously an entrepreneur in derivatives and foreign exchange trading, he is the founder and CEO of UK alternative lender Wellesley & Co.

Early life
Graham Wellesley was born in 1965, the son of Garret Wellesley, 7th Earl Cowley, and his first wife, (Elizabeth) Suzanne Lennon. He has an elder sister, Lady Tara (born 1962). He is a descendant of Henry Wellesley, 1st Baron Cowley, brother of the Duke of Wellington. He spent his early years in California before coming to the UK aged 10, where he attended the American Community School in Hillingdon, west London.

After graduating with a degree in economics from Franklin College, Switzerland, he served for 18 months in the Household Cavalry.

Career
Wellesley’s financial career began in 1985 as a derivatives trader at the London stockbroking firm Hoare Govett, from where he moved to two further derivatives trading roles at Banque Indosuez and ING Charterhouse. In 1992, he became head of foreign exchange trading at global metals trader Gerald Metals.

In 1995, he established the UK foreign exchange market maker IFX, which specialised in contracts for difference (CFDs) and spread bets on equity prices. In 1999, he and another director, Lorenzo Naldini, purchased the 51% of the business owned by its US parent company IFX Corp in a buyout that left them as sole shareholders.

In 2000, IFX was bought by the football pools operator Zetters for £20.4million in a reverse takeover, forming a new entity – IFX Group – with Wellesley as group chief executive. Two years later the company sold its pools business.

In 2003, Wellesley and Naldini left IFX following a disagreement with the board and co-founded ODL Securities, an online foreign exchange and derivatives broker.

In 2005, ODL was the whistleblower in an attempted banking fraud by US hedge fund Bayou. Bayou opened an account with ODL, depositing $101million and requesting two transactions that were refused by the management, who notified the UK Financial Services Authority.

In 2010, Wellesley and Naldini sold their 50% stake in ODL to US foreign exchange firm FXCM Holdings, creating a business employing around 1,000 staff. In December that year, the newly enlarged entity floated on the New York Stock Exchange.

In 2013, Graham Wellesley co-founded alternative lender Wellesley & Co. with three other shareholders, taking the role of chief executive. The following year the company issued what at the time was the largest ever loan by a peer-to-peer lender – a £8.3million bridging loan to a UK urban regeneration scheme.

Personal life
In 1990, Wellesley married Claire L. Brighton. The couple have two sons and a daughter:
 * Henry Arthur Peter Wellesley, Viscount Dangan (born 3 December 1991)
 * Lady Natasha Rose Wellesley (born 28 June 1994)
 * Hon. Bertram Garret Graham Bertie Wellesley (born 12 April 1999)

title: Graham Wellesley, 8th Earl Cowley


text:
Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 12

July 12

 * 2011 – An airstrip laid out along a stretch of highway near Rhebat in the Nafusa Mountains was opened by a senior NTC minister, allowing an air connection via a small private company, Air Libya, between Benghazi and the Amazigh rebels.

 * 2001 – Launch: Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-104 at 05:04 am EDT. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 7A: Quest Joint Airlock.

 * 2000 – Hapag-Lloyd Flight 3378, an Airbus A310, lands 500 metres short of the runway in Vienna after running out of fuel in flight. There are no serious injuries or fatalities.

 * 1994 – A Royal Air Force C-130 Hercules flies the 10,000th United Nations relief flight into Sarajevo.

 * 1988 – Launch of Phobos 2, Soviet unmanned space mission to study Mars.

 * 1988 – First flight of The Scaled Composites Triumph, US twin-engine, business jet prototype designed and built by Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites for Beechcraft, known officially as the Model 143. The Williams FJ44 turbofan engine shared the maiden flight.

 * 1988 – U.S. Navy North American CT-39E Sabreliner, BuNo 158381, c/n 282-93, ex-N4701N, en route from Singapore to Subic Bay Naval Station, Philippines, comes down in the afternoon in the South China Sea near the Spratly Island archipelago, after radioing a distress signal of equipment failure. Vietnamese Navy ship (described by Joe Baugher as a fishing vessel) picks up three American crew, two men and one woman, said a spokesman at the Vietnamese embassy in Bangkok on 15 July, and took them to Vietnam where they were being "treated very kindly". Arrangements would be made to repatriate the crew. At this time the United States and Vietnam had not yet reestablished diplomatic relations.

 * 1985 – First flight of The Antonov An-71 (NATO reporting name: 'Madcap'), Soviet carrier-capable prototype AWACS aircraft, based on An-72, with a completely redesigned rear fuselage supporting the rotodome of the RADAR atop the broad chord forward swept fin.

 * 1983 – Death of Erich Warsitz, German WWII test pilot, chief test pilot at Peenemünde West. He is remembered as the First person to fly an aircraft under liquid-fueled rocket power also the First to fly an aircraft under turbojet power

 * 1980 – First flight of the McDonnell Douglas KC-10 Extender

 * 1979 – Death of Georgy Mikhailovich Beriev, founder of Soviet Union's Beriev Design Bureau which concentrated on amphibious aircraft.

 * 1971 – Piper PA-48 Enforcer, N202PE, c/n PE2-1001, crashes after structural failure due to flutter caused by a Piper-modified elevator trim tab, off of Vero Beach, Florida.9] Four of the heavily modified, turbine-powered TF-51 derivatives were built for the counter-insurgency rôle with two tested at Eglin AFB, Florida in 1983-1984, but no orders were ever placed.

 * 1966 – First flight of the Northrop M2-F2.

 * 1965 – First flight of the Britten-Norman Islander

 * 1957 – "Ike" became the first president to fly in a helicopter. President Eisenhower becomes the first U. S. president to fly in a helicopter when he is flown from the White House to an unnamed military post in a USAF Bell UH-13 J.

 * 1957 – Birth of Rick Husband, USAF test pilot and NASA astronaut.

 * 1952 – First flight of the Bee Aviation 'Honey Bee', single seat light aircraft.

 * 1946 – Unarmed second prototype of the Mikoyan-Gurevich I-250, with strengthened tailplane after crash of first prototype on 5 July 1945, continues flight testing until this date when an engine fire forces an emergency landing and it is damaged beyond repair.

 * 1945 – A US Army Air Forces Douglas A-26C Invader, 44-35553, on a training flight has mid-air collision with Eastern Airlines Flight 45 from Washington, D.C. to Columbia, South Carolina, a Douglas DC-3, NC25647',' at ~3100 feet, 11.9 miles WNW of Florence, South Carolina at 1436 hrs. A-26 vertical fin strikes port wing of airliner, displaces engine of DC-3 which cuts into fuselage; A-26 tail sheared off, two crew parachute, one KWF. DC-3 pilot belly lands in cornfield, one passenger of 24 total on board killed.

 * 1945 – Death of Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen, German WWI fighter ace, and high-ranking officer in WWII, cousin of Lothar and Manfred von Richthofen.

 * 1944 – A Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 88 G-1 night fighter of 7 Staffel/NJG 2, bearing Geschwaderkennung code 4R+UR, on North Sea night patrol landed at RAF Woodbridge. This aircraft carried recent versions of the FuG 220 Lichtenstein SN-2 VHF-band radar, FuG 350 Naxos-Z and FuG 227 Flensburg homer[282] which were being successfully used to intercept RAF night bombers. The German crew had only just completed 100 hours of flight training, and had flown by compass heading, but proceeded on a reciprocal (opposite) course to that intended and thought they were over their own airfield. Within days, the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) analysed the radar equipment and devised countermeasures. This 'coup' repeated the events of the previous year, when a similar radar-equipped Ju 88 (pictured) was flown by a defecting crew to the UK The earlier Ju 88 R-1 nightfighter flown to RAF Dyce by its defecting crew the year before the 13 July 1944 event.

 * 1944 – The first allied jet fighter, the Gloster Meteor Mk 1, entered service with RAF 616 Squadron.

 * 1943 – Flying Officer J. H. Turnbull, a Royal Air Force Squadron Beaufighter pilot, shot down three German Ju-88 bombers over Sicily.

 * 1943 – Germany and Italy mount all air opposition against Allied forces in Sicily from bases in Sardinia and mainland Italy from this date.

 * 1943 (midnight) – An attack by the Allied Northwest African Air Force destroys the headquarters of the Italian Sixth Army at Enna, Sicily.

 * 1941 – Moscow is bombed by the German Luftwaffe for the first time.

 * 1937 (July 12–14) – Mikhail Gromov, A. B. Yumashev, and S. A. Danilin establish a new distance record of 10,148 km (6,303 miles) from Moscow to San Jacinto, California, USA via the North Pole.

 * 1932 – A Junkers J13 crashed near Zlín airport on take off, Czech Republic, killing Tomáš Baťa, Czech entrepreneur, founder of Bata Shoes company. He also founded along with his brother Jan Antonin Bat'à (founder of Zlin Aviation), the Tomáš Baťa aviation, apparently the world's First one to regularly use aircraft for expedient transport of not only high-echelon staff, but in case of need also e. g. skilled workers to places where their skills were needed soon – so the primary aim was the timely deployment of manpower to the spot where it was needed, not creating luxurious "royal barges" for a few chosen.

 * 1929 – First flight of The Dornier Do X, German flying boat, semi-cantilever monoplane powered by twelve engines mounted in six tower nacelles on the wing.

 * 1928 – Emilio Carranza crashes in the New Jersey Pine Barrens while returning from New York City to Mexico City on a historic goodwill flight.

 * 1921 – Major Sheldon Harley Wheeler is killed in the crash of DH-4B, AS-63525, on take off from Luke Field, Ford Island, Oahu, Hawaiian Islands. He was commander of Luke Field at the time of his death. In February 1922 construction began on a new airfield in the Wahiawa District of the Island and on 11 November it was named Wheeler Field in his honour.

 * 1921 – Death of Harry George Hawker MBE, AFC, Australian aviation pioneer and co-founder of Hawker Aircraft, when his Nieuport Goshawk crashed while he was climbing out from Hendon Aerodrome while practicing for an airshow.

 * 1917 – Royal Naval Air Service Flight Lieutenant O. A. Butcher, manning a kite balloon lofted by the destroyer HMS Patriot off the Shetland Islands, sights the German submarine U-69 at a range of 28 nautical miles (52 km), allowing Patriot to intercept U-69 and sink her with depth charges.

 * 1917 – Birth of Luigi Gorrini, Italian WWII fighter ace.

 * 1916 – The United States Navy armored cruiser North Carolina becomes the first ship to launch an aircraft by catapult while underway, launching a Curtiss flying boat piloted by Lieutenant Godfrey Chevalier.

 * 1910 – Death of Charles Stewart Rolls, British motoring and aviation pioneer, First Briton to be killed in a flying accident, when the tail of his Wright Flyer broke off during a flying display near Bournemouth, England. Together with Frederick Henry Royce he co-founded the Rolls-Royce car company.

 * 1901 – Alberto Santos-Dumont, making an attempt on the Deutsch prize in Paris, lands his dirigible No.5 in the Trocadero gardens after one of the cords controlling the rudder snaps. He uses a ladder to repair the machine where it lies before taking off again.

 * 1895 – Birth of Geoffrey Forrest Hughes, Australian WWI flying ace.

 * 1882 – Birth of Charles Voisin, early French aviation pioneer, younger brother of Gabriel Voisin.

 * 1891 – Birth of Oskar Bider, Swiss aviation pioneer.

 * 1849 (July 12 and July 25) – Balloons (Montgolfières) are used for bombardment for the first time, with Austrians bombing Venice.

 * 1812 – Lamp gas used to fill a Montgolfière (Green).

 * 1785 – First manned flight by gas balloon in Netherlands.

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

title: Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 12


text: Category:Buildings and structures in New York (state)


text:
Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 6

July 6

 * 2013 – Asiana Airlines Flight 214, a Boeing 777, crashes short of the runway on landing at San Francisco International Airport, killing three of 307 on board and injuring 182. The crash is the first fatal accident involving the Boeing 777, the first fatal accident in the United States since 2009, and the first fatal accident in North America involving a major airline since 2001.

 * 2013 – Despite suffering a mid-flight tear in its wing, Solar Impulse HB-SIA flies 495 km (307 miles) from Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia outside Washington, D.C., to John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City in 18 hours 23 minutes at an average speed-over-ground of 27 km/h (16.8 mph) and reaching a maximum altitude of 3,110 meters (10,203 feet), becoming the first solar-powered aircraft to fly across the contiguous United States. During the 64-day journey, which had begun on 3 May at Moffett Field in California, HB-SIA has made five intermediate stops and covered 5,659 km (3,514 miles) in 105 hours 42 minutes in the air at an average speed-over-ground of 53.5 km/h (33.2 mph).

 * 2011 – The 2011 Silk Way Airlines Ilyushin Il-76 crash: An Ilyushin Il-76 crashes into a mountain 25 kilometers short of Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, killing all 9 people on board the cargo flight from Baku, operated on behalf of NATO.

 * 2009 – Death of Marius Eriksen, Norwegian skier, WWII fighter ace, model and actor.

 * 2008 – Death of Joseph Otis Fletcher, American Air Force pilot and polar researcher, first pilot to land at the North pole along with William Pershing Benedict with a C-47.

 * 2007 – First flight of the Epic Victory

 * 1998 – Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Airport was closed at 1:28 am with the lights of its 13/31 runway being switched off. Operation of the new Hong Kong International Airport at Chek Lap Kok commenced on the same day, with the first commercial flight landing at 6:25 am.

 * 1996 – Delta Air Lines Flight 1288, a McDonnell Douglas MD-88, experiences an uncontained engine failure during takeoff on Runway 17 at Pensacola, Florida. Fragments from the number one (left) Pratt & Whitney JT8D-219 turbofan engine penetrated the fuselage, killing two and seriously injuring one of the 148 people on board.

 * 1993 – Death of Olive Ann Beech, U. S. aviation pioneer and businesswoman, who founded the Beech Aircraft Company with her husband Walter Herschel Beech.

 * 1992 – The final F-4 Phantom IIs are retired from Royal Air Force service.

 * 1989 – One of two McDonnell-Douglas F-15 Eagles of the 33rd TFW, Eglin AFB, Florida, engaged in 2V2 (two versus 2) aerial combat maneuvers with two Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcons of the Alabama Air National Guard, crashes at 1456 hrs. near Lamison, Alabama a small community ~80 miles SW of Montgomery, the pilot, Capt. Leo Moore of the 58th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ejecting safely. Moore, unhurt, is rescued less than an hour later, said Sandy Mau, a Selma Times-Journal reporter, by an Air National Guard helicopter vectored to him from Danley Field by the F-16 pilots who were flying close enough to Moore to pinpoint his location, said S/Sgt. Dave Beaulieu, 33rd TFW spokesman. Tim Henderson, of nearby Millers Ferry, said that he saw Moore's jet flying low across his pasture minutes before the crash. "It was flying maybe a little over the treetops, very low", Henderson said. "He wasn't flying very fast to be flying so low, and it kind of sounded like the engine was cutting out." The fighter impacted on a ridge in a rural, virtually inaccessible area and Air Force investigators were having difficulty reaching the site, said Mau. The Eagle was completely destroyed. "It just burned up", said Beaulieu. The two F-15s had departed from Eglin at ~1410 hrs. to rendezvous with the F-16s. Moore's fighter was carrying an inert infrared-guided Sidewinder, Beaulieu said. He didn't know how much training the airmen got in before the crash, which occurred ~120 miles NE of Eglin. The pilot underwent a medical check at Eglin regional Hospital and then was sent home, said Beaulieu. "He's fine. He's pretty shaken up, but doing well."

 * 1982 – After the engine fire warning lights illuminate for two of their Ilyushin Il-62′s four engines shortly after takeoff from Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport, the pilots of Aeroflot Flight 411 shut down the engines and attempt to return to the airport on their two remaining engines. The plane crashes in a field in Mendeleyevo, killing all 90 people on board. The engine fire warnings are later reported to be have been false alarms.

 * 1982 – A United States Navy F-4S crashed off USS Forrestal following failure of the catapult strap, pilot missing.

 * 1980 – The largest light airplane meet outside the United States brings 750 small planes to the Popular Flying Associations annual meeting in Leicester.

 * 1976 – Launch of Soyuz 21, Soviet manned mission to the Salyut 5 space station.

 * 1965 – The 1965 Little Baldon Hastings accident occurred when a Handley Page Hastings C1 A transport aircraft operated by No. 36 Squadron Royal Air Force, registration TG577, crashed into a field in Little Baldon, near Chiselhampton, Oxfordshire, shortly after taking off from RAF Abingdon. All 41 aboard, including six crew, perished in the crash, making it the third worst air crash in the United Kingdom at the time.

 * 1964 – U. S. Marine Corps UH-34D transport helicopters airlift a 93-man relief force during the Battle of Nam Dong in South Vietnam.

 * 1960 – Sikorsky’s S-62 amphibious helicopter wins federal approval for operation as a commercial passenger aircraft.

 * 1960 – Goodyear ZPG-3W, BuNo 144242, lost hull pressure, crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off of New Jersey, eighteen of twenty-one crew lost. This was the last U.S. Navy lighter-than-air loss as it leads to cancellation of airship operations on 28 June 1961. Contributing reason of suspension of airship operations is improved speed of Soviet subs.

 * 1959 – A USAF Douglas C-124A-DL Globemaster II, 49-254A, c/n 43183, Jumbo 14, of the 3d Strategic Support Squadron, Strategic Air Command, Barksdale AFB, Louisiana, is involved in a Broken Arrow when it crashes on takeoff from that base at 1411 hrs. CST, two minutes after the start of the takeoff roll, coming down 3,300 feet (1,000 m) S and slightly to the right of runway 14. The cargo load of an unspecified number and type of nuclear weapons was to be transported to Little Rock AFB, Arkansas. One weapon was destroyed by the post-crash fire which also burned out the airframe. No nuclear or high explosive detonation occurred, and contamination was limited to a confined area directly below the weapon. Six flight crew of crew R-41, and one substitution, all survived the crash. Although they denied any knowledge of engine malfunctions during the takeoff roll, witnesses stated that one or more engines were after firing or backfired from the beginning of the roll throughout the entire flight. After approximately 6,000 feet (1,800 m) of ground roll, the airframe assumed a nose high attitude as it climbed to between 50 and 100 feet (30 m), with one or more engines after firing excessively during the climb. The aircraft leveled off briefly before again assuming a nose high attitude when it then settled back to earth amidst smoke and dust. An intense fire then broke out (the aircraft was carrying ~5,000 gallons of fuel). After firefighters extinguished the blaze, weapons were removed using a M246 wrecker and a 40-foot (12 m) trailer.

 * 1952 – Death of Carl Oskar Ursinus, pioneer of German aviation and is remembered mainly for his contributions to sailplane designs and the sport of gliding. He has been nicknamed the Rhönvater ("Rhön father") because he founded Germany’s first gliding club at the Wasserkuppe in the Rhön Mountains. He also pursued experiments in human-powered flight.

 * 1952 – Death of Maryse Bastié, Born Marie-Louise Bombec, French Aerobatic and raid aviator, Crashing with the 2nd prototype Nord 2501 Noratlas in Lyon-Bron, France.

 * 1951 – aerial refueling is used under combat conditions for the first time, with a KB-29 Superfortress refueling four RF-80 Shooting Stars over North Korea

 * 1950 – U. S. Navy Patrol Squadron 46 (VP-46), based at Buckner Bay, Okinawa, begins maritime air patrols of the Taiwan Strait and coast of China to guard against any People’s Republic of China action against Taiwan while the Korean War is raging.

 * 1948 – The US Navy's first two carrier-based AEW squadrons are formed, VAW-1 and VAW-2.

 * 1947 – First flight of the Dassault MD 315 Flamant, French light twin-engined transport airplane.

 * 1943 – A strike by 39 U. S. aircraft destroys a Japanese destroyer beached on Kolombangara island after the Battle of Kula Gulf.

 * 1940 – Twelve Swordfish aircraft from Ark Royal make a torpedo strike against Mers-el-Kébir, sinking a French patrol boat and badly damaging the beached battlecruiser Dunkerque. It is the most successful aerial torpedo attack against a capital ship in history at the time.

 * 1939 – Olga Klepikowa sets a world record by flying an Antonow RF-7 glider 746 km (466 miles) from Moscow to Otradnoje.

 * 1939 – First Autogyro air mail service. Eastern Air Lines, from Philadelphia Post Office to Camden NJ, in a Kellett KD-1 B.

 * 1938 – First flight of The Loire-Nieuport LN.401, French-built dive bomber aircraft.

 * 1937 – A Spanish Republican offensive against Brunete begins, supported by 300 aircraft; the Republicans will use Polikarpov I-15 fighters at night for the first time during the battle, opposing night-bombing German Heinkel He 111 bombers. The Nationalists redeploy German aircraft of the Condor Legion from north to central Spain to support Nationalist ground forces around Brunete.

 * 1935 – Birth of Muhammad Mahmood Alam, Pakistani fighter pilot and North American F-86 Sabre Flying ace.

 * 1934 – French Francois and Génin win the Bibesco cup at an average speed of 313.4 km/h with the A. N. F. Les Mureaux 112 GR raid prototype.

 * 1927 – The crash/ditching in the Pacific Ocean ~1 mi off of Fort DeRussy, Territory of Hawaii, of Boeing PW-9A, 26-353, of the 19th Pursuit Squadron, from Wheeler Field, Oahu, kills Arizona native 1st Lt. Charles Linton Williams (1898–1927). Higley Field, at Mesa, Arizona, is renamed Williams Field on 24 February 1942, and Williams Air Force Base in January 1948. The base was closed on 30 December 1993.

 * 1926 – First flight of the Macchi M.39

 * 1924 – Robert Michael White, NYC, test pilot (X-15) was born.

 * 1922 – The first use of naval aircraft in combat in Latin America takes place in Brazil during the first Tenente revolt when two Brazilian Navy aircraft bomb the rebellious Fort Copacabana in Rio de Janeiro.

 * 1919 – The first person to arrive in the United States by air from Europe is Englishman Flt. Lt. J. E. M. Pritchard. He arrives with the airship R.34, which has entered American skies after leaving Scotland on July 2 to cross the North Atlantic.

 * 1915 – Lt Oswald Boelcke claims his first victory, a Blériot Parasol, while flying an Albatros C.I two-seater with Lt von Wühlisch as the observer & gunner.

 * 1914 – Death of Georges Legagneux, early French aviator who set altitude records, in the crash of his monoplane near Saumur, France.

 * 1892 – Birth of Willy Omer Francois Jean Coppens, Belgium's leading fighter ace and the champion "balloon buster" of WWI.

 * 1866 – First South American military balloon reconnaissance ascent. The 6th of July, Lieutenant Colonel Roberto A. Chodasiewicz, an Argentine Army military engineer, makes the first South American military observation ascent, manning a Brazilian Army’s captive ballon over Paraguayan troops, during the Triple Alliance War.

 * 1819 – First woman to be killed in an aviation accident: Sophie Blanchard, when her hydrogen-filled balloon caught fire and crashed to the ground.

title: Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 6


text:
User:Shoka

Male. Brit. UK Resident. Venerable and ancient.Technologist. Networks particularly. And can't spell.

Linux user. Linux desktop user. Homebuilt Dual Athlon four spindle 430 Gb Linux desktop user. Still can't spell

AT&T employee Diver and keen snorkeler

Handle is from the C.J.Cherryh novel The Paladin --Shoka 22:09, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Places and Fortresses of Malta
Marsaskala    Fort Manoel    St Mary's tower      St Mark's tower

Fort St Angelo Fort Ricasoli Fort St Elmo         Ghallis Tower

Fort Delimara Fort Tas-Silġ  St Paul's Bay tower  Fort Leonardo

St Paul's battery Fort Benghisa

Engineering
Babbitt metal

Instrumentation
Isotope Mass Spectrometry

Military History and Technology
Star fort Polygonal fort Langues

Guthrie rolling bridge

Open Software and Network Technology
IPCop Homebuilt computer Bird Internet routing daemon Quagga Internet routing daemon

title: User:Shoka


text:
Vunivalu of Bau

Turaga na Vunivalu na Tui Kaba, shortened as Vunivalu, is the Paramount Chief of the Kubuna Confederacy of the island of Bau in Fiji. Loosely translated the title means Warlord of Bau or "Root of War". The succession to the title does not follow primogeniture, but the candidate must be a high-ranking member of the Tui Kaba clan.

History
The Vunivalu was not always the senior Chieftain in Kubuna and Bau. When Vueti a great grandson of Lutunasobasoba defeated the Tui Viti's sons at Nakauvadra, he was awarded with a Tui Viti sacred stone- award signifying authority (tawake or flag). From Nakauvadra, he left via Nakorotubu and had his 1st child, a son through supernatural powers or Gonesau known as Nadurucoko who was raised by the Dewala tribe at Korolevu fort in Dewala, Nakorotubu. Nadurucoko the first (1st) Gonesau, was the father of Nabuinivuaka Nailatikau 1- the 1st Vunivalu of Bau. He then continued on his returned journey to Moturiki and finally to Bau. Vueti as the founder of Bau island in short for 'veibauyaki' or nomadic tribe (named after his last temporary nomadic residence in Bau in Wainibuka) was bestowed with the Roko Tui Bau title. Vueti then ordered for a sacred temple to be built in Bau and kept the Tui Viti sacred stone award of authority (tawake) that was given by the chiefs at Nakauvadra at the foundation mound and named the temple as Vatanitawake translated as 'the shelter or shelve of the signifying authority award or flag'.

The Vunivalu of Bau title was considered subordinate to the Roko Tui Bau. Power struggles between the various chiefly households came to a head with the exile of the Vunivalu Tanoa Visawaqa in the early 19th century after a series of murders and reprisals. His son Seru Epenisa Cakobau however was allowed to remain in Bau during his fathers exile. Cakobau gained power by subverting the Lasakau people to plot and execute the overthrow of the ruling group, led by Ratu Ravulo Vakayaliyalo, in 1837; Seru Epenisa Cakobau then reinstated his father as ruler.

Cakobau eventually succeeded to the title himself. He created much of its prestige by styling himself King of Fiji; he led the process that culminated in cession of the islands to the United Kingdom in 1874.

The position fell vacant with the death of Ratu Sir George Cakobau, in 1989. For the next decade, there was a search for a successor. On 9 June 2005, his son Senator Ratu George Cakobau Jr. announced that the chiefs of Matanitu o Bau (the traditional chiefly government of Bau, which includes the districts of Namata, Namara, Nausori, Dravo, Buretu, Kiuva, and Viwa (Fiji), had selected four chiefly candidates, to be submitted to the Tui Kaba clan, which will be asked to choose one of them as the next Vunivalu. The four candidates are Ratu George Cakobau Jr. himself, his brother Ratu Epenisa Cakobau, Ratu George Kadavulevu Naulivou, and former Vice-President Ratu Jope Seniloli. A second meeting held a week later tentatively proposed Senator Cakobau as the new Vunivalu.

Cakobau's appointment had still not been finalized and was not without controversy. Adi Finau Tabakaucoro, a member of the Tui Kaba clan and a senior chief, complained on 27 June that the proper procedures were not being followed. The new Vunivalu should be elected by the whole clan, she said, rather than chosen by a few elders. She thought it wrong to exclude from the list of candidates the name of Senator Cakobau's sister, Adi Samanunu Cakobau-Talakuli, because she was the eldest child of the last Vunivalu.

Attempts to find an agreeable successor again failed in 2012, and the selection process was put on hold for the time being. Former vice-president Seniloli died in 2015 and Senator Cakobau in 2018. In 2023 Ratu Epenisa Cokabau, great-great grandson of Ratu Seru Epenisa Cakobau and king of Fiji, was installed in a traditional ceremony.

Other titles
The Vunivalu when installed, also takes the title of Tui Levuka, as he is the traditional leader of the Levuka people of Lakeba, Lau. The wife of the Vunivalu is titled Radi Levuka.

title: Vunivalu of Bau


text:
Talk:Allen Pineda Lindo

Hey, can anyone fill in anything about the African-American side of Apl? It's in the article but I can't find anything online. I admit, he looks black, and since he comes from a poor family near Angeles there's one obvious possibility... anyone know anything solid?

Allen Pineda aka apl.d.ap and at mga sip-sip
Being the offspring of a happily married african-american serviceman and filipino mother, I can speak first hand on the discrimination and blunt racism which apl.d.ap would have experienced. Filipinos are denying their own brown skinned roots in favor of their wish to be anglo-centric. Were it not for his self reliance and self worth in being a seminal factor in the Black Eyed Peas, he would still be in Sapang-bato riding his carabao, being belittled for his dark complexion and kinky hair. Facing daily barbs of ignorance, hatred, and racism because of his mixed heritage, it's no wonder he doesn't make mention of it himself. There is probably many a fair complexioned filipino star bourne of wealth or political ties who wish they had an iota of apl.d.ap's talent. These same "stars" would not have paid him a second glance in Barangay Sapang-bato. They are the "sip-sip". Much respect to apl.d.ap from a real cababayan.

Uh yeah, so any actual information? The article says "African American" but do we know that for sure? He looks like he's part black to me (and this is in no way a slam on his identification as Pinoy) but that doesn't necessarily mean it came from an African American though that would seem most likely. He may have good reason to not want to talk about it and he has every right not to but in the meantime we do have an unverified claim in the article.

Page name
I propose that this article be moved to Apl.de.ap, in keeping with Naming conventions; articles should be titled as the name that a public figure is most known as. For precedent, see Taboo (rapper), Will.i.am, Mario (singer), Brandy (entertainer), Bill Clinton, Eminem, Madonna (entertainer), etc. --DropDeadGorgias (talk) 19:43, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

title: Talk:Allen Pineda Lindo


text: Category:Towers in New York (state)

title: Category:Towers in New York (state)


text:
Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 8

July 8

 * 2011 – Hewa Bora Airways Flight 952, a Boeing 727, crashes on landing at Bangoka International Airport, Democratic Republic of the Congo, killing 74 of 118 on board.

 * 2011 – Launch: Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-135 at 15:29 UTC. Mission highlights: Payload Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) Raffaello. Final flight of Atlantis, final flight of the Space Shuttle program.

 * 2010 – The first Solar Impulse aircraft, HB-SIA, the first solar-powered aircraft capable of both day and night flight thanks to its batteries charged by solar power, makes its first overnight flight, taking off from Payerne Airport outside Payerne, Switzerland, and returning after 26 hours 10 minutes 19 seconds in the air, the first overnight flight by a solar-powered aircraft and the longest flight in history up to this time by a manned solar-powered aircraft. The flight also sets a record for the highest altitude ever attained by a manned solar-powered aircraft, reaching 8,744 meters (28,687 feet) above ground and 9,235 meters (30,298 feet) in absolute altitude.

 * 2008 – Three Airmen of the 319th Special Operations Squadron, 1st Special Operations Wing, avoid serious injury when the leased Pilatus PC-12 they are training in crashes at the end of the runway at Hurlburt Field, Florida, Eglin Auxiliary Field 9, at ~2330 hrs. as they attempt a landing. The initial investigation finds that the turboprop encountered wake turbulence from another aircraft that had landed shortly before the accident. As a precaution, the three crew were taken to the Eglin hospital and released the same afternoon. Hurlburt leases the PC-12 to train Airmen for the U-28A, the Air Force's version of the single-engine utility aircraft, used in combat for intra-theatre support for the special operations forces.

 * 2007 – Boeing 787 Rollout (7/8/2007) in Everett, Washington’s Boeing Everett Factory.

 * 2006 – Aerospace scientists in Toronto conduct the first confirmed flight of a manned ornithopter operating under its own power.

 * 2003 – Sudan Airways Flight 139, a Boeing 737-200, crashes shortly after taking off from Port Sudan, Sudan. The plane crashes into a hill while attempting an emergency landing. All 117 on board the plane perish; a two-year-old boy initially survives the crash, but dies the following day.

 * 2000 – Aerocaribe Flight 7831, a British Aerospace Jetstream 32, crashes near Chulum Juárez, Mexico, killing all 19 on board.

 * 1999 – Death of Charles "Pete" Conrad, Jr., American naval officer, test pilot, astronaut and engineer, and the third person to walk on the Moon.

 * 1994 – Launch: Space Shuttle Columbia STS-65 at 12:43:01 pm EDT. Mission highlights: First Shuttle-Mir docking.

 * 1992 – First flight of the Bede BD-10

 * 1991 – A US Navy F/A-18 Hornet is forced to shoot down an E-2 Hawkeye after its crew abandons it following an engine fire

 * 1988 – (8-13) 11-year old Chris Marshall flies a Mooney M20 from San Diego to Paris.

 * 1983 – General Dynamics rolls out the 1,000th F-16 Fighting Falcon

 * 1977 – Death of Katherine Stinson, US early female flier and aviation pioneer.

 * 1967 – Boeing B-52 Stratofortress 56-0601 overran the runway on landing at Da Nang Air Base, Vietnam with the loss of five of her six crew. The aircraft had suffered an electrical malfunction that led to the flameout of two engines and was attempting to make an emergency landing.

 * 1966 – US airline strike begins and lasts until Aug 19th.

 * 1965 – Canadian Pacific Air Lines Flight 21, a Douglas DC-6, crashes near 100 Mile House, British Columbia after the explosion of a device in the lavatory; all 46 passengers and six crew aboard perish.

 * 1965 – Death of Albert Paul Mantz, American noted air racing pilot and movie stunt pilot, while flying the very unusual aircraft (Tallmantz Phoenix P-1) for the movie 'The Flight of the Phoenix'.

 * 1962 – Alitalia Flight 771, a Douglas DC-8-43, crashes 11 km (6.8 mi) northwest of Junnar, India, while on approach to a landing at Bombay 84 km (52 mi) to the northeast. All 94 people on board die.

 * 1960 – First flight of the Mikoyan-Gurevich Ye-150, prototype single-seat fighter/interceptor, part of the Mikoyan-Gurevich Ye-150 family.

 * 1959 – The Argentine Navy commissions its first aircraft carrier, (V-1). She is the first aircraft carrier to enter service in Latin America.

 * 1958 – First flight of the Borgward Kolibri, German three-seated utility helicopter, First German helicopter after WWII.

 * 1958 – A Lockheed U-2A, 56-6713, Article 380, of the SAC's 4028th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron (SRS), based at Laughlin Air Force Base, Del Rio, Texas, is lost near Wayside, Texas, when it goes out of control at high altitude, killing RAF pilot, Sqn. Ldr. Christopher Walker, one of four RAF officers in U-2 training. This aircraft, the 40th U-2 built, was delivered to the USAF in July 1957, and assigned to the 4080th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing, Laughlin AFB, Texas, where it was configured as a "ferret" aircraft.

 * 1956 – A USAF Lockheed T-33A Shooting Star, based out of Lackland AFB, Texas, crashes into side of Pleasant Mountain in Denmark, Maine, killing Capt. Gordon L. Draheim. Cause determined to be disorientation and fuel exhaustion.

 * 1953 – Sabena begins the first international helicopter service, linking Belgium, the Netherlands and France

 * 1952 – New York Airways begins inter-airport helicopter services to link Idlewild, La Guardia, and Newark airports.

 * 1952 – Israeli IAF/DF de Havilland Mosquito T.3, 2119, as Capt. Daniel Shapira demonstrates a take-off to Lt. Ze'ev Tavor it goes badly, airframe ending up in the weeds. Despite this, both pilots eventually become test pilots. This was the first Israeli loss of the type.

 * 1950 – U. S. Navy P2 V-3 Neptunes of Patrol Squadron 6 (VP-6) begin air patrols along the east coast of Korea.

 * 1948 – A USAF Douglas C-47A-30-DK Skytrain, 43-48256[157] crashes near Wiesbaden, Germany, killing three crew. This was the first accident during the Berlin Airlift. KWF were 1st Lt. George B. Smith, 1st Lt. Leland V. Williams, and Karl v. Hagen of the Department of the Army. (One source incorrectly lists this crash as involving a C-54 Skymaster.)

 * 1948 – First flight of the Ilyushin Il-28

 * 1948 – The USAF accepts its First female recruits into a program called Women in the Air Force (WAF).

 * 1947 – First flight of the Boeing 377

 * 1947 – First flight of the Yakovlev Yak-23

 * 1947 – The Kenneth Arnold sightings: Reports are broadcast that a UFO crash landed in Roswell, New Mexico.

 * 1946 – First of two Vought XF4U-5 Corsairs, created by mating Vought F4U-4 Corsair BuNo 97296 with a Pratt & Whitney R-2800-32W radial engine, first flown 3 July 1946, lost during routine test flight when pilot Bill Horan attempts dead-stick landing at Stratford, Connecticut. Airframe destroyed, pilot killed.

 * 1944 – The second B-29 Superfortress raid on Japan attacks four cities on Kyūshū from bases in China.

 * 1944 – Swordfish aircraft from the British Merchant Aircraft Carrier (or “MAC-ship”) MV Empire MacCallum mistakenly sink the Free French submarine La Perle. It is the only time that MAC-ship-based aircraft sink a submarine.

 * 1943 – British air raid sinks U-232.

 * 1941 – A trial raid by three Royal Air Force Fortress I heavy bombers on the naval barracks at Wilhelmshaven, Germany, is the first combat use of any variant of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress.

 * 1940 – Aircraft from the British aircraft carrier HMS Hermes torpedo the French battleship Richelieu at Dakar, Senegal, damaging her. Richelieu is not seaworthy again for a year.

 * 1940 – (Overnight) 64 British bombers strike airfields in the Netherlands and ports in north Germany and lay sea mines. Germany’s first specialized night fighter unit, Nachtjagdgeschwader 1, scores its first victory, as Oberfeldwebel Hermann Förster shoots down a Whitley off Heligoland.

 * 1940 – (8-13) Italian high-level bombers subject ships of the British Mediterranean Fleet to repeated heavy attacks while the fleet is at sea in the Mediterranean. They score only one hit, on the light cruiser HMS Gloucester.

 * 1936 – First landing of an aircraft at Rhein-Main-Flughafen (Today Frankfurt am Main Airport) is made by a Junker Ju-52.

 * 1935 – Birth of Vitaly Ivanovich Sevastyanov, Soviet cosmonaut

 * 1908 – Thérèse Peltier becomes the first woman to fly in an aeroplane. She is a passenger on a flight made by Léon Delagrange at Turin.

 * 1892 – Birth of Nikolai Nikolaevich Polikarpov, Soviet aircraft designer, known as "King of Fighters".

 * 1883 – Birth of Charles Rumney Samson CMG, DSO & Bar, AFC, British naval aviation pioneer and WWI pilot.

 * 1838 – Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin is born in Baden, Germany. The first large-scale builder and pioneer of rigid dirigible balloons, Zeppelin made his first balloon ascent while serving as a volunteer and observer for the Union Army in America’s Civil War.

title: Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 8


text:
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is a musical comedy with music and lyrics by William Finn, with a book written by Rachel Sheinkin, conceived by Rebecca Feldman with additional material by Jay Reiss. The show centers on a fictional spelling bee set in a geographically ambiguous Putnam Valley Middle School. Six quirky adolescents compete in the Bee, run by three equally quirky grown-ups.

The 2005 Broadway production, directed by James Lapine and produced by David Stone, James L. Nederlander, Barbara Whitman, Patrick Catullo, Barrington Stage Company and Second Stage Theater, earned good reviews and box-office success and was nominated for six Tony Awards, winning two, including Best Book. The show has spawned various other productions in the United States, and other countries.

An unusual aspect of the show is that four real audience members are invited on stage to compete in the spelling bee alongside the six young characters. During the 2005 Tony Awards, former presidential candidate Al Sharpton competed. Another amusing aspect of the show is that the official pronouncer, usually an improv comedian, provides ridiculous usage-in-a-sentence examples when asked to use words in a sentence. At some shows, adult-only audiences (over age 16) are invited for "Parent-Teacher Conferences" also known as "adult night at the Bee". These performances are peppered with sexual references and profanity inspired by R-rated ad-libs made during rehearsals.

The Broadway cast album was released on May 31, 2005, and is available from Ghostlight Records, an imprint of Sh-K-Boom Records. The original Broadway cast recording was nominated for a Grammy Award. In April 2021, a Disney film adaptation was announced to be in the works.

Background and original productions
The musical was based upon C-R-E-P-U-S-C-U-L-E, an original improvisational play created by Rebecca Feldman and performed by The Farm, a New-York-based improvisational comedy troupe. Sarah Saltzberg, Wendy Wasserstein's weekend nanny, was in the original production, and Wasserstein recommended that Finn see the show. Finn brought Rachel Sheinkin on board, and they worked together with Feldman to transform C-R-E-P-U-S-C-U-L-E into a scripted full-length musical.

Spelling Bee was workshopped and developed at the Barrington Stage Company (BSC), Massachusetts, where Julianne Boyd is the Artistic Director, in two different stages. In February 2004, a workshop was done in which a first act and parts of a second act were created – this stage of the process was directed by Michael Barakiva and Feldman. The script was fleshed out and the show was given a fuller production in July 2004, directed by Feldman and Michael Unger. Dan Knechtges choreographed the workshop, summer productions, and the Broadway production. Dana Harrel produced both productions as the Producer of Stage II at BSC. Several cast members, Dan Fogler, Jay Reiss, and Sarah Saltzberg remained from C-R-E-P-U-S-C-U-L-E. Robb Sapp (later replaced by Jose Llana when Sapp moved on to Wicked), Dashiell Eaves (replaced by Derrick Baskin), Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Celia Keenan-Bolger (joined as Olive Ostrovsky in the summer), Lisa Howard, and Deborah S. Craig were added to the cast, and a full script was created.

The musical opened Off-Broadway at the Second Stage Theatre on January 11, 2005, in previews, officially on February 7, 2005, and closed on March 20, 2005. The production won several awards, among them the 2005 Lucille Lortel Awards, Outstanding Musical and 2005 Drama Desk Awards, Outstanding Ensemble Performance.

Spelling Bee premiered on Broadway at the Circle in the Square Theatre on April 15, 2005, and closed on January 20, 2008, after 1,136 performances and 21 previews. The director was James Lapine and the choreographer was Dan Knechtges. The show won Tony Awards for Best Book (Rachel Sheinkin) and Best Featured Actor (Dan Fogler).

Subsequent productions
The first production outside the United States was at the Melbourne Theatre Company in Melbourne, Australia, from January 18, 2006, to February 25 at the Playhouse, Arts Centre Melbourne. It starred Marina Prior as Ms. Peretti, David Campbell as Chip, and Magda Szubanski as Barfée. The production, which won the 2006 Helpmann Award for Best Musical, was then presented by the Sydney Theatre Company at the Sydney Theatre in 2007. It again starred Prior and Szubanski, now joined by Lisa McCune as Olive. The Sydney season opened on June 11, 2007, and closed in August 2007.

The musical was produced in San Francisco, California, at the Post Street Theatre opening on March 1, 2006, and closing on September 3, 2006. In Chicago the run began on April 11, 2006, at the Drury Lane Theatre, Water Tower Place, closing on March 25, 2007. The production was directed by James Lapine. In Boston it opened at the Wilbur Theatre on September 26, 2006, and closed December 31, 2006. The majority of the San Francisco cast moved to the Boston production.

The Equity U.S. National Tour began in Baltimore, Maryland at the Hippodrome Theatre on September 19, 2006, going through May 2007, visiting over 30 cities across the U.S. From May 24 to June 17, 2007, the original Broadway cast reunited for a limited four-week run at the Wadsworth Theater in Los Angeles. The musical returned to Barrington Stage Company, where it originated, in 2008, and ran from June 11 to July 12, 2008. The production included several cast members from the touring company and was a co-production with North Shore Theatre. The first performance in-the-round was at the North Shore Music Theatre in Beverly, Massachusetts from August 12–31, 2008.

In 2007, the first translated production opened in Seoul, South Korea, with all of the music and dialogue in Korean, but the words were spelled in English. In September 2008, a German-language adaptation premiered as Der 25 Pattenser Buchstabierwettbewerb.

The 2008–2009 Non-Equity U.S. National Tour premiered on October 11, 2008, at the Union Colony Civic Center in Greeley, Colorado, with an official opening in Fort Collins, Colorado on October 14.

The Mason Street Warehouse, Saugatuck Center for the Arts, Saugatuck, Michigan, opened on August 14 and ran through August 31, 2009, directed by Kurt Stamm.

The musical made its UK premiere at the Donmar Warehouse, London, beginning previews on February 11, 2011. It officially opened on February 21, and closed on April 2. The director was Jamie Lloyd.

Spelling Bee made its Scandinavian debut in September 2012 in Oslo, Norway.

Spelling Bee was performed for the first time in Israel, with Hebrew subtitles in October 2012, at the AACI J-Town Playhouse theater in Jerusalem. Spelling Bee had an additional series of performances in September 2017 in Israel by the organization The Stage, at the Beit Yad leBanim theatre in Tel Aviv.

The original Broadway cast of Spelling Bee reunited for a one-night only 10th anniversary concert at The Town Hall on July 6, 2015. All actors reprised their roles for the performance with the exception of Celia Keenan-Bolger as Olive Ostrovsky, with Jenni Barber who had previously played the role on Broadway stepping into the role: Keenan-Bolger joined the cast for the concert's finale, performing Olive's monologue as she had a decade prior. The concert was organized in tribute to original production stage manager Andrea "Spook" Testani-Gordon, who passed away from cancer the previous November.

Synopsis
-Act 1-

While setting up for the spelling bee, moderator Rona Lisa Peretti has a flashback to when she won the Third Annual Spelling Bee, but is interrupted by the entrance of Chip Tolentino. The spellers are introduced as they enter and they sing about their anticipation of the bee ("The Twenty-Fifth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee"). Rona calls up four audience participants and requests to speak privately to Olive Ostrovsky, who has not yet paid the entrance fee. After Olive reveals that her parents are not present and she arrived by bus, Rona decides to let the fee slide for the moment. She then introduces the official word pronouncer, Douglas Panch, and comfort counselor, Mitch Mahoney. Mitch leads the spellers in the Pledge of Allegiance and while Panch explains the rules, Rona gushes over what she loves about the bee ("The Spelling Rules / My Favorite Moment of the Bee 1").

The spelling bee begins. Each time a speller is called, Rona shares a piece of information about them. When Leaf Coneybear is first called up, he has a flashback to when he got into the county bee on a lark. His word is capybara, which he ends up spelling correctly while in a trance. Olive is shown to be shy and reserved, a result of her largely absent parents. She has come to love spelling by reading the dictionary in her home ("My Friend, the Dictionary"). When William Barfée is called to spell for the first time, Rona describes his unusual technique – he spells the word out on the ground with his foot to get a visual before speaking it. After the audience spellers get easy words, the cast spellers rant about how the element of luck makes the bee unfair ("Pandemonium"). Logainne then gets "Cystitis", and is shown studying with her two often-arguing fathers in a flashback. When Leaf is called the second time, he reminisces about how his family calls him "dumb" ("I'm Not That Smart").

Barfée is called, and sings about his technique ("Magic Foot"). When Marcy is called again, she correctly spells "qaimaqam", proving herself to be the best speller, though she is somewhat hurt when Rona claims that she is "all business". Chip is called next, but he is reluctant to take his turn because he has an erection after fantasizing about Leaf's sister, Marigold. Under threat of disqualification (a fact not helped because he is asked to spell a somewhat erotic sounding word), he misspells his word and Mitch hauls him off ("Pandemonium (Reprise) / My Favorite Moment of the Bee 2").

At this point, the last audience speller is eliminated. Mitch sings a special serenade to this audience member for making it this far ("Prayer of the Comfort Counselor").

-Act 2-

Panch calls a snack break, and Chip passes through the audience selling snacks. He explains to the audience why he lost ("My Unfortunate Erection (Chip's Lament)"). Barfée taunts Chip, who throws a bag of peanut M&M's at him. Barfée is allergic to peanuts, so Olive picks them up for him. Olive and Barfée converse before the second half of the bee begins, and Barfée begins to develop a crush on Olive.

Logainne describes her two overbearing fathers and the stress that they put on her ("Woe is Me"). In a montage sequence, the bee is shown progressing through many rounds, ending with Leaf's elimination. He walks away with his head held high, having proven to himself that he is smarter than his family gave him credit for ("I'm Not that Smart (Reprise)").

Marcy reveals more about her stressful life ("I Speak Six Languages"). She is given the word camouflage, to which she sighs, "Dear Jesus, can't you come up with a harder word than that?" Jesus then appears to her and teaches her that she is in control of her own life. Resolved to do what she wants rather than what is expected of her, she intentionally misspells the word and exits excitedly ("Jesus / Pandemonium (Reprise #2)").

Olive gets a call from her father, who she has been hoping would arrive. Panch attempts to disallow her from answering the phone, but she persuades Rona to take the call for her, leading her to learn that her father will miss the bee due to working longer than expected. Logainne then begins an ad-libbed rant about the bee, her fathers, and current political events. Panch lashes out at Logainne and is escorted offstage by Rona and Mitch. One of Logainne's fathers jumps onstage to calm Logainne down and pours some of his soda on the floor to make Barfée's foot stick and thus disrupt his technique.

With Panch calmed down, Olive is called to spell. She imagines her parents being there and giving her the love that she always has wanted and yearned for ("The I Love You Song"). Barfée is called to spell next, and spells his word correctly despite the soda causing his foot to stick. Logainne misspells her next word ("Woe is Me (Reprise)") and Rona is excited that it has come down to the final two ("My Favorite Moment of the Bee 3").

The finals are shown through another montage ("Second"), and Olive and Barfée continue to grow closer. Eventually, Olive misspells a word, giving Barfée a chance to win. He is torn between winning and letting Olive win, but with Olive's encouragement, he spells his word correctly. Panch awards Barfée the trophy and two hundred dollar prize, and, in a surprise act of charity, pays Olive's entrance fee, calling it a "runner-up prize." Olive congratulates Barfée, and each character reads a sentence or two about what they do in the years and decades after the main action of the play ends ("Finale").

Musical numbers
(Songs are not listed in the Playbill since, with audience members on stage, the timing of the "Goodbye" songs varies with each show and because it could spoil who wins the bee.)

 * "The Twenty-Fifth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" – Chip, Rona, Leaf, Logainne, Barfée, Marcy, Olive
 * "The Spelling Rules" ‡ – Panch, Spellers, Rona, Mitch
 * "My Favorite Moment of the Bee" ‡ – Rona
 * "My Friend, the Dictionary" – Olive, Chip, Leaf, Logainne, Rona, Company
 * "The First Goodbye" – Company
 * "Pandemonium" – Chip, Olive, Logainne, Leaf, Barfée, Marcy, Mitch
 * "I'm Not That Smart" – Leaf
 * "The Second Goodbye" – Company
 * "Magic Foot" – Barfée, Company
 * "Pandemonium (Reprise)" ‡ – Mitch, Company
 * "My Favorite Moment of the Bee (Reprise)" ‡ – Rona
 * "Prayer of the Comfort Counselor" – Mitch, Company
 * "My Unfortunate Erection/Distraction (Chip's Lament)" – Chip
 * "Woe is Me" – Logainne, Carl, Dan, and Company
 * "Spelling Montage" † – Panch, Spellers
 * "I'm Not That Smart (Reprise)" – Leaf
 * "I Speak Six Languages" – Marcy, Females
 * "Jesus" † – Marcy, Females
 * "The I Love You Song" – Olive, Olive's Mom, Olive's Dad
 * "Woe is Me (Reprise)" – Logainne, Mitch
 * "My Favorite Moment of the Bee (Reprise 2)" ‡ – Rona
 * "Second" ‡ – Barfée, Olive, Company
 * "Second (Part 1)" – Barfée, Olive, Company
 * "Weltanschauung" – Barfée, Company
 * "Barfée and Olive Pas de Deux" – Company
 * "Second (Part 2)" – Barfée, Olive, Company
 * "The Champion" – Rona, Company
 * "Finale" – Company
 * "The Last Goodbye" – Company

‡ Combined into one track on the cast album

† Not included on the cast album

There is a song on the cast album, called "Why We Like Spelling". This song is sung by all the spellers, but is not in the Broadway production or in the licensed productions.

A song entitled "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee Massacres the 12 Days of Christmas" was released online as a holiday track sung by the cast. It reveals several different instances of events within the lives of the characters, such as Coneybear being given 2 right socks named "Phil", Olive discussing various places her dad forgets her at, Barfée ruling his sea anemone circus from his basement, Panch's urine laced with Ritalin, Rona's most recent boyfriend breaking up with her, Mitch ending up and making calls from prison, Logainne explaining her dads giving her stomach ulcers, Chip playing with his little league baseball team, and Marcy receiving the 7th book of Moses (which Logainne repeatedly objects to, claiming there's only 5) while fighting with her understudy who was taking her place because "Deborah [S. Craig, the regular Marcy actress] hurt her knee".

Major characters

 * Rona Lisa Peretti: The number-one realtor in Putnam County and returning moderator. She is a sweet woman who loves children, but she can be very stern when it comes to dealing with Vice Principal Panch, who has feelings for her that she most likely does not return. It is implied that she sees much of herself in Olive Ostrovsky. Her favorite moments of the Bee are: the minutes before it starts, when all the children are filled with the joy of competition before they begin to resent each other, how everyone has an equal chance of winning, citing as an example that last year's winner can be this year's loser and vice versa, and when the last spellers go head to head for the top spot because it is so suspenseful and filled with hope. Ms. Peretti herself won the Third Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee by spelling "syzygy", which she recounts at the very beginning of the opening number.
 * Vice Principal Douglas Panch: After five years' absence from the Bee, Panch returns as judge. There was an "incident" at the Twentieth Annual Bee, but he claims to be in "a better place" now (or so we think), thanks to a high-fiber diet and Jungian analysis. He is infatuated with Rona Lisa Peretti, but she does not return his affections.
 * Mitch Mahoney: The Official Comfort Counselor. An ex-convict, Mitch is performing his community service with the Bee, and hands out juice boxes to losing students.
 * Olive Ostrovsky: A young newcomer to competitive spelling. Her mother is in an ashram in India, and her father is working late, as usual, but he is trying to come sometime during the bee. She made friends with her dictionary at a very young age, helping her to make it to the competition.
 * William Morris Barfée: A Putnam County Spelling Bee finalist last year, he was eliminated because of an allergic reaction to peanuts. His famous "Magic Foot" method of spelling has boosted him to spelling glory, even though he only has one working nostril and a touchy personality. He has an often-mispronounced last name: it is Bar-FAY, not BARF-ee ("there's an accent aigu", he explains with some hostility). He develops a crush on Olive during the second half of the show. In the end he wins the spelling bee.
 * Logainne "Schwartzy" SchwartzandGrubenierre: Logainne is the youngest and most politically aware speller, often making comments about current political figures, with two overbearing gay fathers pushing her to win at any cost. She is somewhat of a neat freak, speaks with a lisp, and knows she will return to the bee next year.
 * Marcy Park: A recent transfer from Virginia, Marcy placed ninth in last year's nationals. She speaks six languages, is a member of an all-American hockey team, a championship rugby player, plays Chopin and Mozart on multiple instruments, sleeps only three hours a night, hides in the bathroom cabinet, and is getting very tired of always winning. She is a total over-achiever, and attends a Catholic school called "Our Lady of Intermittent Sorrows". She is also not allowed to cry.
 * Leaf Coneybear: A homeschooler and the second runner-up in his district, Leaf gets into the competition on a lark: the winner and first runner-up had to go to the winner's Bat Mitzvah. Leaf comes from a large family of former hippies and makes his own clothes. He spells words correctly while in a trance. In his song, "I'm Not That Smart", he sings that his family thinks he is "not that smart", but he insinuates that he is merely easily distracted. Most of the words that he is assigned are South American rodents with amusing names.
 * Charlito "Chip" Tolentino ("Tripp Barrington" in the original workshop, "Isaac 'Chip' Berkowitz" in the Chicago production): A Boy Scout and champion of the Twenty-Fourth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, he returns to defend his title. Relatively social and athletic, as he plays little league, Chip expects things to come easily but he finds puberty hitting at an inopportune moment.
 * Three or four spellers from the audience: Audience members are encouraged to sign up to participate before the show, and several are chosen to spell words on stage. In touring productions, local celebrities are sometimes selected.

Minor characters
(All can be doubled by the actors playing the major characters.)
 * Carl Grubenierre: One of SchwartzandGrubenierre's fathers; he has set his heart on his little girl winning the Bee, no matter what he has to do, including sabotaging William's foot. Usually played by the actor who plays Leaf.
 * Dan Schwartz: SchwartzandGrubenierre's other father; he is more laid back and doting than Carl but is still intent on his daughter winning the Bee. Usually played by the actor who plays Mitch.
 * Leaf's Dad: Doubtful and finds his son annoying and unintelligent. Usually played by the actor who plays Barfée.
 * Leaf's Mom: Overprotective and doubtful of her son's abilities to stand up to the competition. Usually played by the actor who plays Logainne.
 * Leaf's Siblings: Not very confident of Leaf's abilities. Usually played by the remaining spellers (both cast and the volunteer audience spellers).
 * Olive's Mom and Dad: She is in India, he is working late, but they appear in Olive's imagination to encourage her and tell her they love her. Usually played by the actors who play Miss Peretti and Mitch.
 * Jesus Christ: Appears to Marcy in a moment of crisis. Usually played by the actor who plays Chip.

Casting history
The principal casts of notable productions of The Twenty-Fifth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee

 * Notable Broadway cast replacements included Jennifer Simard as Rona, Barrett Foa, Rory O'Malley, and Stanley Bahorek as Leaf, Josh Gad as Barfée, Greta Lee as Marcy, James Monroe Iglehart as Mitch Mahoney, and Mo Rocca and Darrell Hammond as Panch.

Audience interaction and words used
About half an hour before the show begins, audience members in the lobby are given the chance to sign up to participate in the show as "spellers." The registration form asks for name, occupation, hobbies, description of clothing, spelling ability, and age range. Interviewers look for people with no acting experience, unique names, traits, and backgrounds. The audience participants are taken backstage prior to the show and are shown where to stand when called from the audience and given instruction about what to do when called upon to spell. They are asked to request a definition of each word and its usage in a sentence, and to attempt to spell each word rather than giving up. The final audience member to be eliminated is usually given an exceptionally difficult word they are sure to miss; regardless of the spelling the cast reacts with incredulity at their "success," and the next word is "belled" as incorrect before the attempt is completed. During the performance, the actors sitting next to the audience participants periodically whisper hints about when to stand, sit, move in "slow motion," "freeze" or hang on because the seating platform unit is about to spin.
 * Audience interaction

Ms. Peretti calls the spellers to the stage at the beginning of the show, and they are given badges to wear that say "Finalist." As the show proceeds, each one is eliminated with successively more difficult words. The final audience participant to be eliminated is serenaded by Mitch ("Prayer of the Comfort Counselor") on-stage. Mitch also gives each eliminated finalist (both audience members and regular characters) a juice box and a hug.

Katharine Close, the 2006 winner of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, was invited to be a contestant at a performance of the show. She was the last speller from the audience to be eliminated and survived fourteen rounds.

The musical treats the audience members as if they were the audience at the fictitious spelling bee. For example, the characters single out audience members as their "family" members. For example, Barfée periodically refers to an age-appropriate woman near the stage as "mom." Similarly, Chip is distracted by an attractive female audience member (or male in the adults-only version), contributing to a misspelling. He is the first contestant eliminated and is thus forced to sell snacks in the audience in the manner of the refreshment hawkers at a sports event. Other characters frequently walk through the auditorium among the audience during the show, sometimes integrating the audience into the show and occasionally dropping the "fourth wall".

Examples of words spelled by characters in performances of Spelling Bee include astrobleme, cat, dinosaur, hasenpfeffer, origami (Adult Show), and weltanschauung. Words spelled by the audience volunteers are often unscripted and sometimes improvised by the cast to gently poke fun at the volunteer speller. Past examples include: dystopia, cenacle, elephant, hemidemisemiquaver, homunculus, cow, jihad, lysergic acid diethylamide, castoreum and didgeridoo spelt by Rolf Harris. Julie Andrews missed "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" when she was a guest speller on KIDS night on Broadway, 2007.
 * Words used

Critical response
Charles Isherwood, in his review of the Broadway production for The New York Times, wrote "Most crucially, the affectionate performances of the six actors burdened with the daunting challenge of inhabiting young souls have not been stretched into grotesque shape by the move to a large theater... William Finn's score sounds plumper and more rewarding than it did Off Broadway. If it occasionally suggests a Saturday morning television cartoon set to music by Stephen Sondheim, that's not inappropriate. And Mr. Finn's more wistful songs provide a nice sprinkling of sugar to complement the sass in Rachel Sheinkin's zinger-filled book... Mr. Lapine has sharpened all the musical's elements without betraying its appealing modesty." (NY Times Critics Pick).

Later adaptations
In April 2021, Walt Disney Pictures announced plans to develop a film adaptation of the musical, to be produced by Dan Lin and Jonathan Eirich through their Rideback banner, with Ryan Halprin as executive producer.

On January 25, 2023, the school board for Cardinal Local School District in Ohio halted a student production of the musical on the grounds that it was "vulgar." The Cardinal School District denied their decision was made because the musical depicts two gay characters, and confirmed that a "revised" version of the play would proceed as planned.


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Sartell Dam

The Sartell Dam is a dam across the Mississippi River in Sartell, Minnesota in the United States. The dam was used to generate hydroelectric power for the adjoining Sartell Paper Mill before it burned down in 2012. The dam is referred to as the Champion Dam in official documentation.

Construction of the structure was begun by the Watab Pulp and Paper Company in 1907 and finished in 1911. Seven workers died during construction, most from drowning as a result of washouts on the site's cofferdam. A cave-in on the dam's west end also killed the son of the project's foreman.

The dam was constructed of wooden planks, local granite, and field stones as well as 25,000 barrels concrete.

Between 1960 and 1964, the dam was rebuilt by the St. Regis Corporation which had purchased the adjoining paper mill in 1946. The mill and dam are currently owned by Verso Paper.

Construction of the dam resulted in the formation of Little Rock Lake approximately five miles (8 km) upriver. The dam itself is 20 feet tall.

title: Sartell Dam


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Boris Pash

Boris Theodore Pash (born Boris Fyodorovich Pashkovsky; Борис Фёдорович Пашковский; 20 June 1900 – 11 May 1995) was a United States Army military intelligence officer. He commanded the Alsos Mission during World War II and retired with the rank of colonel.

Early life
Boris Fedorovich Pashkovsky was born in San Francisco, California, on 20 June 1900. His father was Reverend Theodore Pashkovsky (who would become Most Reverend Metropolitan Theophilus from 1934 to 1950), a Russian Orthodox priest and later archbishop who had been sent to California by the Church in 1894. One of his earliest memories was of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

His father was recalled to Russia in 1906, and the entire family returned to Russia in 1913. His mother was Serbian American Ella Dabovich, sister of Sebastian Dabovich, a monk who also lived in America and was canonized after death as an Orthodox saint.

In 1916–1917, both father and son joined the ranks of the Russian army as it fought against Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I: Theodore – as a military chaplain, and 16-year-old Boris – as an artillery private to the 52nd Infantry Division. During the Russian Revolution, the family fled to Simferopol, Crimea, where Boris worked for the YMCA. By February 1920, Boris joined the White navy in the Black Sea and served on the navy cruiser General Kornilov. Boris saw action against the Bolsheviks at sea, and in March 1920, he was awarded the Cross of St. George, fourth class.

On 1 July 1920, he married Lydia Vladimirovna Ivanova, and chose to return to the United States when the Bolshevik consolidation of power became apparent. He was able to secure employment with the YMCA in Berlin, where his son Edgar Constantine Boris Pashkovsky was born on 14 June 1921.

Upon returning to the United States with his family in 1923, he attended Springfield College, in Springfield, Massachusetts, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Physical Education. It was during this time that he changed the family name from Pashkovsky to Pash.

Pash taught and coached baseball at Hollywood High School in Los Angeles from 1924 until 1940, where students included Lana Turner, Judy Garland, and Mickey Rooney. During this time he continued his education, receiving a Master of Science in Education from the University of Southern California in 1939. He also joined the United States Army Reserve, and was assigned to the Infantry Intelligence Branch. As part of his training, he qualified for certification by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

World War II
Pash was called to active duty with the Army in 1940, and became chief of counter-intelligence at the IX Corps Area headquarters at the Presidio of San Francisco. In that role he became involved with the 1942 Baja Peninsula mission that investigated the possibility of the Japanese establishing a base in Mexico during World War II.

Pash was also called upon to investigate suspected Soviet espionage at the Radiation Laboratory at the University of California. He interrogated staff, including Robert Oppenheimer, whom he concluded "may still be connected with the Communist Party". Pash did not believe that Oppenheimer was a spy. He felt that Oppenheimer's personal honor and concern for his reputation would deter him from such action. Pash therefore did not recommend Oppenheimer's removal from the Manhattan Project, merely that Oppenheimer be accompanied by counter-intelligence agents.

He was also the military leader of the Alsos Mission, an Allied operation established in late 1943 to determine how far the Axis had progressed toward developing nuclear weapons by seizing facilities, materiel, and scientists related to the German nuclear energy project. During this mission, he had a heated run-in in Italy with Moe Berg, a former Major League Baseball catcher turned spy. On the mission in 1944, Pash personally carried harmful materials for seven hours in his pocket, which led to a radium burn (in his own words, it looked "like a map on my hip here").

Post war
After the war, Pash served in various military intelligence positions. He served under General Douglas MacArthur in Japan in 1946 and 1947. Thanks to his efforts, the Soviet attempt to gain a foothold in Japan through a local Orthodox Church failed. Instead, Pash organized for the Bishop Benjamin (Basalyga) to arrive in early January 1947 to take the reins, and thus the North American Metropolia, rather than the then Soviet-controlled Moscow Patriarchate, secured influence in the region. As a result of this combination, Pash had a public clash with the Soviet General Kuzma Derevyanko. On 9 January, two days after the first sermon of the new bishop, a reception was held at the Dutch embassy at which Pash met his longtime acquaintance, Lieutenant General Derevyanko, who represented the USSR in the Allied Council for Japan. The rival picks of the Russian emigrant and the Soviet commander were well known; in addition, they sometimes played against one another in chess. Shaking the Russian-American's hand that winter day, Derevyanko publicly declared: "Ah, my good friend Colonel Pash has again checkmated me. Of course, you understand, I'm speaking of the game of chess." Boris retorted: "I can assure you, gentlemen, that the other times are in the line of duty."

From 1948 to 1951, he served as a military representative to the Central Intelligence Agency. During this time, he was in charge of a controversial CIA program called PB-7, which had been formed to handle "wet affairs" like kidnappings and assassinations. There is no evidence that he ever carried out any such activities, and denied that he had in testimony before the Church Committee in 1975. He served as Special Forces planning officer with the U.S. forces in Austria from 1952 to 1953. His final postings were back in the United States, as Deputy Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence of the Sixth Army from 1953 to 1956), and in the office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Guided Missiles in Washington, D.C., from 1956 until his retirement from the Army in 1957. In 1954, he testified in the Oppenheimer security hearing, recounting the misgivings that he had about Oppenheimer in 1943.

On leaving the Army, Pash became chief of the Eastern European and USSR Division of the Quartermaster Technological Intelligence Agency. In 1961 he transferred to the United States Army Foreign Science and Technology Center. He retired from the civil service in June 1963. In retirement, he helped rebuild the Saint Nicholas Orthodox Cathedral in Washington, DC.

In retirement, Pash published The Alsos Mission, a book recounting his wartime experiences in Europe, in 1980. The year 1981 saw the court hearings on the internment of the Japanese-Americans. Pash was one of the few officers alive to be brought to testify. Grilled hard by the judge, Pash did not relent and maintained that the unlawful actions against the American citizens needed to be assessed in the context of the 1940s, rather than in hindsight. He was inducted into the Military Intelligence Hall of Fame in 1988. His decorations included the Army Distinguished Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Order of the British Empire and the Order of St. George.

He was one of the few White Russian veterans to live to see the end of Communist Party rule in Russia. Pash died on 11 May 1995 in Greenbrae, California at the age of 94, and was buried in the Serbian Cemetery in Colma, California. He was survived by his wife Gladys and son Edgar. His papers are in the Hoover Institute at Stanford University.

In popular culture
Pash was played by Casey Affleck in Christopher Nolan's 2023 film Oppenheimer.

title: Boris Pash


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Merle Robbins

Merle Robbins (September 12, 1911 – January 14, 1984) was an American barber from Reading, Ohio, who invented the card game UNO.

In 1971, he invented UNO to resolve an argument with his son Ray, a teacher, about the rules of Crazy Eights. The original decks were designed and made on the family dining room table. He and his family mortgaged their home to raise $8,000 and created the first 5,000 UNO decks to sell. At first, he sold them out of his barber shop, while his son Ray handed them out to his students. In 1972, he sold the rights to UNO to International Games for $50,000 plus royalties of 10 cents per copy.

Today, the game is produced by toy giant Mattel in 80 countries and has sold 151 million copies worldwide.

Robbins died in 1984 in Cincinnati. He was 72.

title: Merle Robbins


text:
Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 4

July 4

 * 2012 – Two Swedish advertising agency employees, Thomas Mazetti and Hannah Frey, take off from Pociūnai Airport in Lithuania, make an illegal 90-minute flight into Belarus at an altitude of 50 meters (165 feet) in a Jodel biplane, and drop 879 parachute-equipped teddy bears adorned with human rights and freedom-of-speech slogans into the southern suburbs of Minsk.

 * 2012 – The American deep-sea exploration vessel Nautilus discovers the wreckage of the Turkish Air Force F-4 Phantom II shot down on 22 June and the bodies of its two-man crew on the floor of the Mediterranean Sea at a depth of about 1,000 meters (3,281 feet). The Turkish armed forces announce that they have begun an effort to recover the bodies.

 * 2011 – Missinippi Airways Cessna 208 crash: A pilot attempted to abort its take off from Pukatawagan Airport. The aircraft overran the runway and crashed into a ravine where it caught fire and was destroyed. One passenger was killed, the pilot and seven other passengers were injured and transported to hospital. None of those transported to hospital received life-threatening injuries.

 * 2007 – An OH-58 Kiowa 95-0002 crashes into power lines in Mosul, killing the pilot and injuring the copilot.

 * 2006 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-121 at 18:37:55 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS Flight ULF1.1: Supply, crew rotation, MPLM Leonardo.

 * 2005 – Deep Impact's impactor successfully collided with the 9P/Tempel 1 comet's nucleus.

 * 2002 – An Egyptian-American man, Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, opens fire on the El Al ticket counter at Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles, California, killing two Israelis and wounding four other people before an El Al security guard shoots him to death.

 * 2002 – Benjamin O. Davis Jr., leader of the famed all-black Tuskegee Airmen during World War II and the first black general in the Air Force, died in Washington at age 89.

 * 2001 – Vladivostok Air Flight 352, a Tupolev Tu-154 enters a flat spin on approach to Irkutsk Airport in Irkutsk, Russia, crashes down onto its belly and bursts into flames in a wooded area, killing all 145 aboard.

 * 2000 – Malév Flight 262, a Tupolev Tu-154, lands on its belly at Thessaloniki International Airport in Greece. There are no serious injuries or fatalities.

 * 1997 – Mars Pathfinder (MESUR Pathfinder), American spacecraft carrying a base station with roving probe, lands on Mars

 * 1992 – USS George Washington (CVN-73), American nuclear-powered supercarrier, is Commissioned.

 * 1989 – 1989 Belgian MiG-23 crash: The pilot of a Soviet Air Force Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-23M (Flogger-B) ejects shortly after take-off in Poland. The "runaway" pilotless aircraft flies across Europe before crashing into a Belgian farmhouse, killing an 18-year-old man.

 * 1988 – Death of Donald Roderick MacLaren, Canadian WWI fighter ace, who helped to found the Royal Canadian Air Force, and later formed Pacific Airways

 * 1986 – First flight of the Dassault Rafale

 * 1983 – Launch of BOR-5, Russian space vehicle, 1:8 Buran model designed to test the main aerodynamic characteristics, thermal and acoustic loads and stability for the Shuttle Buran program.

 * 1982 – Landing: Space shuttle Columbia STS-4 at 16:09:31 UTC. Mission highlights: Last shuttle R&D flight, first DoD payload.

 * 1980 – A seven-year-old boy is killed and several others are injured when he manages to fire an ejection seat in Lockheed S-3A Viking, BuNo 159769, c/n 394A-1098, of VS-24, at NAS Willow Grove, Pennsylvania during an open house.

 * 1979 – Death of Frank H. Ellis, early Canadian aviator, aircraft designer and author ("Canada's Flying Heritage", the first major study of the History of aviation in Canada). He was the First Canadian to make a parachute jump from an airplane in Canada.

 * 1977 – Patricia Undall and Nan Gaylord win the 30th and final annual women's United States transcontinental air race, nicknamed 'The Powder Puff Derby'.

 * 1975 – First flight of the Boeing 747SP, modified version of the Boeing 747 jet airliner which was designed for ultra-long-range flights. The SP stands for "Special Performance".

 * 1973 – A Grumman HU-16 Albatross, American large twin-radial engine amphibious flying boat, sets a world record for twin-engine amphibians reaching 32,883 feet.

 * 1964 – Last flight by the RCAF of the Canadian built Avro Lancaster B X.

 * 1961 – Birth of Richard Allen Garriott (Richard Garriott de Cayeux), British / American video game developer and entrepreneur and space self-funded tourist.

 * 1958 – Ghana Airways is formed.

 * 1958 – First flight of the SAN Jodel D.140 Mousquetaire (Musketeer), French five-seat light touring monoplane.

 * 1957 – First Flights: Ilyushin Il-18

 * 1956 – A Lockheed U-2 reconnaissance aircraft makes its first operational overflight. It is designed to fly at subsonic speeds and photograph the earth from above 60,000 feet.

 * 1955 – An Anti-Submarine Helicopter Squadron was formed at HMCS Shearwater, Dartmouth, NS.

 * 1952 – 58 Republic F84 Thunderjets take off for a trans-ocean flight of 10,895 miles, with seven stops, from Georgia in the USA to Yokota in Japan.

 * 1950 – Seafires and Fireflies from Triumph strikes targets of opportunity in Korea, including a railway bridge and a column of North Korean troops.

 * 1948 – The Northwood mid-air collision between a Scandinavian Airlines System-operated Douglas DC-6 and an RAF Avro York kills all 39 passengers and crew in Britain's worst mid-air collision

 * 1946 – The aircraft carriers USS Antietam (CV-36) and USS Boxer (CV-21) are among ten U. S. Navy ships participating in the celebration at Manila of the independence of the Republic of the Philippines.

 * 1946 – Pacific Theatre ace Lt. Col. John C. "Pappy" Herbst (18 credited victories) is mortally injured at the age of 36 in front of 30,000 people at the San Diego County Fair when his Lockheed P-80A-1-LO Shooting Star, 44-85083, of the 445th Fighter Squadron, 412th Fighter Group, March Field, California, crashes after failing to pull up in a dive just west of the Del Mar Fairgrounds while flying with an early jet demonstration team. Herbst crashed in a dry riverbed near the Del Mar Racetrack after his aircraft stalled during an encore of their routine finale in which the pair of P-80s did a loop while configured to land. Herbst had married his second wife less than 24 hours before. Herbst's wingman, Major Robin Olds narrowly avoided the same fate while flying in formation

 * 1945 – 483 B-29 s drop 3,752 tons (3,403,792 kg) of bombs on Kōchi and other cities in Japan.

 * 1944 – Allied assault on Carpiquet airport at Caen.

 * 1944 – Death of Sadao Yamaguchi, Japanese WWII flying ace, killed in action

 * 1943 – 17 Japanese bombers escorted by 66 fighters raid Rendova, destroying and damaging several landing craft.

 * 1943 – Death of Ichirobei Yamazaki, Japanese WWII flying ace, killed in action.

 * 1943 – The prototype Platt-LePage XR-1 helicopter, 41-001, tested at Wright Field, Ohio, by the Rotary Branch of the Air Technical Service Command from May 1943, is damaged this date by the failure of a rotor blade spinner. Never ordered into production, its last flight will take place on 21 June 1946 with 91 hours, 45 minutes of flight time, and it will be donated the National Air Museum in Washington, D.C., where it remains in storage at the Paul Garber Facility at Silver Hill, Maryland.

 * 1943 – RAF Consolidated LB-30 Liberator II, AL523, crashes on takeoff from RAF North Front Field, Gibraltar, killing the exiled Polish Prime Minister General Władysław Sikorski, together with his daughter, his Chief of Staff, Tadeusz Klimecki, and seven others. The flight departed at 2307 hrs., coming down in the sea after only 16 seconds of flight. Only the pilot, Eduard Prchal (1911–1984), survives. "This crash is shrouded in mystery and intrigue. Throughout World War II Sikorski tried to organize the Polish Army and constantly negotiated with Churchill and Roosevelt to circumvent any appeasement deals between the Allies, Russia, and Germany which would come at Poland's expense. By this time, the Free Poles had found out about the Katyn Massacre, and thus terminated relations with the Soviet Union on 26 April 1943. As Sikorski was the most prestigious leader of the Polish exiles, his death was a severe setback to the Polish cause, and was certainly highly convenient for Stalin. It was in some ways also convenient for the western Allies, who were finding the Polish issue a stumbling-block in their efforts to preserve good relations with Stalin. This has given rise to persistent suggestions that Sikorski's death was not accidental. This has never been proved."

 * 1942 – US air offensive against nazi-Germany begins.

 * 1941 – Death of Stepan Pawlowitsch Suprun, Soviet Test pilot and WWII pilot, killed in Action in his MIG-3.

 * 1940 – In retaliation for the British attack at Mers-el-Kébir, French Air Force bombers raid Gibraltar, causing little damage.

 * 1940 – Last scheduled airmail flight by autogiro Kellett KD-1 is flown.

 * 1933 – Death of Henri Robida, French raid aviator.

 * 1930 – Brothers John, Kenneth, Albert, and Walter Hunter set a new record after a flight of 553 hours 40 min over Chicago using two Stinson SM-1 Detroiters as refueler and receiver.

 * 1929 – The Japanese aviator Masashi Goto crashes and is killed in Utah’s Uinta Mountains in the beginning stages of an attempted flight around the world by crossing the continents of North America, Europe and Asia.

 * 1927 – First flight of the Lockheed Vega.

 * 1922 – Death of Lothar-Siegfried Freiherr von Richthofen, German WWI fighter ace, younger brother of top-scoring ace Manfred von Richthofen, killed in the crash of his LVG C VI at Fuhlsbüttel due to an engine failure.

 * 1920 – Death of Jaime Gonzáles Grocier, early Cuban aviator, in a crash.

 * 1917 – Death of Ivan Alexandrovich Orlov, Russian WWI flying ace, Self Glider and Aircraft designer, killed in a dogfight with 4 Germans, Losing the lower right wing of his Nieuport and fatally crashing.

 * 1915 – Lt Oswald Boelcke claims his First victory, a Blériot Parasol, while flying an Albatros C. I two-seater with Lt von Wühlisch as the observer & gunner.

 * 1911 – First ever commercial cargo to be carried by an aircraft. The General Electric company paid £100 to have a case of electric lamps flown from Shoreham to Hove in England.

 * 1910 – Hubbard failed one attempted flight at the Montreal Air Meet. The Hubbard monoplane was the first aircraft ever sold in Canada and the first to be exported.

 * 1908 – The Zeppelin LZ-4 makes a 12-hour flight crossing the Alps. It covers the 235 miles from Friedrichshafen to Zürich and reaches speeds of 32 mph.

 * 1908 – Glenn H. Curtiss is awarded the Scientific American trophy for a public flight of over 1 km. Curtiss flies 1,550 m (5,090 ft).

 * 1895 – A large German military balloon burst at the German Army's Balloon Department grounds. Five balloonists were injured.

 * 1895 – Birth of Kurt Haber, German WWI flying ace.

 * 1894 – Birth of Arthur Laumann, German WWI flying ace who scored 28 victories in just over three months.

 * 1893 – Birth of Alvin Andrew Callender, American WWI flying ace.

 * 1892] – Birth of Henry Maston Mullinnix, American aviator, engineer and Admiral of the US Navy during WWII, mainly responsible for developing the air-cooled engine for naval aircraft.

 * 1891 – Birth of William James Arthur "A rt" Duncan, Canadian WWI flying ace, Hockey player and coach post WWI.

 * 1858 – Birth of Marie Paul Jules Lebaudy, French industrial and politician, early dirigible pioneer along with his brother Joseph Marie Pierre Lebaudy.

 * 1798 – At least one balloon of the French army‘s Company of Aeronauts is transported aboard the French Navy warship Le Patriote for use ashore in conducting a reconnaissance of the coast of Egypt, but Le Patriote strikes a rock and sinks off Alexandria, Egypt.

 * 1753 – Birth of Jean-Pierre Blanchard, aka Jean Pierre François Blanchard, French inventor, most remembered as a pioneer in aviation and ballooning.

title: Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 4


text:
Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 16

July 16

 * 2011 – Launch of GPS IIF-2, GPS satellite.

 * 2009 – N350AN, a Boeing 767-323ER operated by American Airlines, is substantially damaged when the nosewheel collapses on the ground at Fort Worth Alliance Airport, United States, during post-maintenance checks.

 * 2009 – A Pakistan Air Force Lockheed Martin F-16A Block 15AQ OCU Fighting Falcon, 92729, ex-92-0405, on a routine night training exercise from No. 9 Squadron from Mushaf Airbase crashes 105 km south-west of Sargodha, Pakistan resulting in the death of the pilot, Squadron Leader Saud Ghulam Nabi. Another source gives the accident date as 17 July.

 * 2007 – A US F-16, serial 92-3901, from the 35th FW crashed. The pilot survived. The crash was attributed to under-inflation of the landing gear tires.

 * 2005 – An Equatorial Express Antonov An-24 crashes into a mountain side near Baney, Equatorial Guinea; all 60 on board die.

 * 2004 – Death of Major General Charles W. Sweeney, USAAF WWII pilot and the pilot who flew the "Fat Man" atomic bomb to Nagasaki.

 * 2002 – Bristow Helicopters Sikorsky S-76 A crash: G-BJVX, a commercial Sikorsky S-76 A helicopter operated by Norwich-based Bristow Helicopters, crashed in the southern North Sea while it was making a ten minute flight between the gas production platform Clipper and the drilling rig Global Santa Fe Monarch, after which it was to return to Norwich Airport. The accident caused the death of all those on board (two crew members and nine Shell workers as passengers). The body of the eleventh man has never been recovered.

 * 1999 – John F. Kennedy, Jr. plane crash: A Piper Saratoga piloted by John F. Kennedy, Jr. – The son of President John F. Kennedy – crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, killing all three people on board: Kennedy, his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and her sister, Lauren Bessette.

 * 1989 – European air traffic is halted due to industrial action by French air traffic controllers.

 * 1986 – Launch of Soyuz T-15, Soviet manned mission to both space stations Mir and Salyut 7.

 * 1986 – The Atlas Cheetah, fighter aircraft built as a major upgrade of the Dassault Mirage III by the Atlas Aircraft Corporation (later Denel Aviation) of South Africa, is First unveiled.

 * 1983 – A British Airways Sikorsky S-61 helicopter crashes into the sea off the Isles of Scilly; 20 of 26 people on board die, in the worst helicopter accident in the United Kingdom to this date and sparking a review of helicopter safety.

 * 1970 – First flight of the Aérospatiale Corvette

 * 1969 – Apollo 11 blasted off from Cape Kennedy, Fla., on the first manned mission to the surface of the moon.

 * 1965 – First launch of the Proton, expendable launch system used for both commercial and Russian government space launches.

 * 1965 – First flight of the North American Rockwell OV-10 Bronco, an American twin-turboprop light attack and observation aircraft.

 * 1962 – NASA civilian Test pilot Joseph A Walker takes X-15 to 32,600 m.

 * 1957 – KLM Flight 844, a Lockheed Super Constellation, crashes after takeoff from Biak-Mokmer Airport, Indonesia, killing 58 of 68 on board.

 * 1957 – First Flights: Aerotécnica AC-14

 * 1957 – Flying a Vought F8U-1P Crusader photographic reconnaissance aircraft, United States Marine Corps Major John H. Glenn sets a North American transcontinental speed record, flying from Los Alamitos, California, to Floyd Bennett Field in New York City nonstop in 3 hours, 28 min, 50 seconds, at an average speed of 723.517 mph (1,165.084 km/hr) with three aerial refuelings.

 * 1956 – First flight of The Lavochkin La-250 "Anakonda", Soviet high-altitude interceptor aircraft prototype.

 * 1954 – Canadian fighter pilots, flying Sabre Mk.Vs, participated in Exercise “Dividend” in the skies over Great Britain to test the British air defence system.

 * 1953 – USAF Lieutenant Colonel W. F. Barnes, flying a North American F86D Sabre, sets the world's first speed record over 700mph

 * 1951 – First flight of the Iberavia I-11 EC-AFE (Or Iberavia I-11), Spanish low-wing monoplane of conventional configuration with fixed, tricycle undercarriage and a large, bubble canopy over the two side-by-side seats.

 * 1950 – Okinawa-based U. S. Navy PB4Y-2 Privateers of Patrol Squadron 28 (VP-28) begin patrols of the coast of the People’s Republic of China.

 * 1950 – Birth of Valery Yevgenyevich Maksimenko, Soviet Air Force Test Pilot.

 * 1950 – First flight of the Boisavia Chablis, French 2-seat high wing monoplane light sport aircraft prototype

 * 1948 – First flight of the Vickers Viscount

 * 1948 – Catalina seaplane Miss Macao (VR-HDT), operated by a Cathay Pacific subsidiary, with 23 passengers and 3 crew on board flying from Macau to Hong Kong is hijacked mid-way over the Pearl River Delta by a group of 4 hijackers attempting to rob the passengers on board. The pilot is attacked and the aircraft loses control during the ensuing struggle in the cockpit. The subsequent crash kills all on board except one passenger, who was later identified to be the lead hijacker. This is the first known case of airliner hijack.

 * 1947 – Geoffrey Tyson test-pilots the Saunders-Roe SR.A/1 TG263, the first jet fighter to be modified as a flying boat.

 * 1945 – 471 B-29 s drop 3,678 tons (3,336,660 kg) of bombs on Numazu and other cities in Japan.

 * 1945 – First atomic weapon is successfully detonated at the Trinity test site at Alamogordo in New Mexico, USA.

 * 1944 – Royal Navy Vought Corsair I out of NAS Brunswick, Maine, is destroyed when it flies into Sebago Lake near Raymond, Maine; crew condition unknown.

 * 1943 – An Italian torpedo bomber damages the British aircraft carrier HMS Indomitable off Cape Passero, forcing her to proceed to Gibraltar for repairs.

 * 1941 – The Hillson Bi-mono, British experimental aircraft designed to test the idea of "slip-wings", where the aircraft could take off as a biplane, jettison the upper, disposable wing, and continue flying as a monoplane, successfully dropped over the Irish Sea the upper wing with no great change in trim and a few hundred feet in altitude being lost

 * 1935 – Death of Käthe Paulus, German Balloonist, aerobatic pilot and early parachute designer.

 * 1934 – Death of Kurt Wahmke, German Rocket pioneer, along with 2 technicians, when the chamber exploded during a test. First and only deaths of technicians in the history of German rocket development

 * 1930 – Birth of Francis Herbert Goldsborough, American aviator who held the junior transcontinental air speed record, dying from wounds after His plane crashed in Vermont the day before.

 * 1930 – Transcontinental and Western Air (TWA) is formed when Transcontinental Air Transport and Western Air Express merge.

 * 1930 – July 16-August 8, the second International Tourist Aircraft Contest Challenge 1930 in Berlin, won by the German crew of Fritz Morzik on the BFW M.23 plane.

 * 1927 – Ernie Smith and Emory Bronte complete the first civilian non-stop flight from North America to the Hawaiian Islands when their Travel Air monoplane, the City of Oakland, crashes on Molokai after a flight from Oakland, California. They survive the crash.

 * 1925 – Early example of a production Fokker D.XIII is used to set four new world airspeed records: the airspeed record for carrying a 500 kg/1,102 lb payload (265.7 km/h or 165.7 mph), the record for carrying the same payload over a distance of 200 km (264.2 km/h or 164.7 mph), at the same time setting the same records for carrying a 250 kg (551 lb) payload.

 * 1922 – At Hampton Roads, Virginia, the United States Navy’s only balloon ship, the lighter-than-air craft tender USS Wright (AZ-1), flies her balloon for the last time. She soon is rebuilt as a seaplane tender (AV-1) with no balloon capability.

 * 1921 – First flight of the Avro 552, a British light biplane aircraft, Evolution of the AVro 504.

 * 1921 – Cambridge wins the first air race between Oxford and Cambridge universities, using S. E. 5 as. airplanes.

 * 1920 – First flight of the Blériot-SPAD S.34

 * 1918 – Death of Awdry Morris "Bunny" Vaucour, British WWI flying ace, Killed in a "friendly fire" incident, when an Italian Hanriot pilot shot his Sopwith Camel.

 * 1918 – Death of Hans Kirschstein, German WWI fighter ace, killed in a crash on a return flight from Fismes in a Hannover CL.II piloted by Leutnant Johannes Markgraf

 * 1918 – Death of Andre Jean Louis Barcat, French WWI flying ace, killed in action.

 * 1918 – Death of Lionel Arthur Ashfield, British WWI flying ace, killed in his Airco de Havilland DH.4 along with his Observer, Irish Maurice Graham English.

 * 1917 – Death of Fritz Krebs, German WWI flying ace, killed in action

 * 1912 – Naval torpedo launched from an airplane patents by B A Fiske.

 * 1911 – The LZ 10 Schwaben enters commercial service. It will go on to become the first commercially successful passenger aircraft.

 * 1910 – First flight of The Duigan pusher biplane (or often simply the Duigan biplane), unnamed early aircraft which made the First powered flight by an Australian-designed and -built machine.

 * 1895 – Birth of Jacques Toussaint François Ortoli, French WWI flying ace who also served in WWII.

 * 1892 – Birth of Michel Joseph Callixte Marie Coiffard, French WWI fighter ace

 * 1887 – Birth of Walter Edwin Lees, early American aviator and record setter.

 * 1878 – Birth of Aldo Corazza, Italian aviation pioneer and early aircraft designer.

title: Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/July 16