title: Billy Preston

text: Preston had suffered kidney disease in his later years, brought on by his hypertension. He received a kidney transplant in 2002, but his health continued to deteriorate. He had voluntarily entered a drug rehabilitation clinic in Malibu, California, at the suggestion of guitarist Is'real Benton, and suffered pericarditis there, leading to respiratory failure that left him in a coma from November 21, 2005. Preston died on June 6, 2006, in Scottsdale, Arizona.


title: Billy Preston

text: Preston's funeral was held June 21, 2006. At the funeral, which lasted almost three hours, Joe Cocker sang, Little Richard reminisced, and a brass band played a stirring version of "Amazing Grace". Other musical performers included The Temptations' lead vocalist Ali Woodson and singer Merry Clayton. A gospel choir, clad in bright red, sang throughout. The mourners also heard letters written by Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton and others who had toured and recorded with Preston. He was buried at Inglewood Park Cemetery in Inglewood, California.


title: Billy Preston

text: Ringo Starr, speaking during the rehearsals for the Concert for George in 2002, called Preston one of the greatest Hammond organ players of all time. In another interview Starr said, "Billy never put his hands in the wrong place. Never."


title: Billy Preston

text: Preston's song "Nothing from Nothing" was featured on the soundtracks of 2003's Elf and 2008's "Be Kind Rewind".


title: Billy Preston

text: In his introduction to the 2010 BBC Radio program "Billy Preston: That's the Way God Planned It", former Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman said of Preston: "Every keyboard player I know loves Billy Preston. You can spot his playing a mile off, whether it's the Hammond organ, the Fender Rhodes or the piano. He had such a "spiritual" touch to his technique; it made him completely unique."


title: Billy Preston

text: In 2021, White Horse Pictures and Homegrown Pictures announced that they were making a documentary on Preston, to be directed by Paris Barclay.


title: Billy Preston

text: Preston was nominated for nine Grammy Awards and won two. He won a Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance for "Outa-Space" at the 15th Annual Grammy Awards in 1973. He also won a Grammy Award for Album of the Year for his participation in the album "The Concert For Bangla Desh" at the same ceremony.


title: Billy Preston

text: He was inducted into the Class of 2021 of the Rock and Roll Hall Fame with the Musical Excellence Award.


title: Jack London

text: John Griffith Chaney (January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors to become an international celebrity and earn a large fortune from writing. He was also an innovator in the genre that would later become known as science fiction.


title: Jack London

text: London was part of the radical literary group "The Crowd" in San Francisco and a passionate advocate of animal rights, workers’ rights and socialism. London wrote several works dealing with these topics, such as his dystopian novel "The Iron Heel", his non-fiction exposé "The People of the Abyss", "War of the Classes", and "Before Adam".


title: Jack London

text: His most famous works include "The Call of the Wild" and "White Fang", both set in Alaska and the Yukon during the Klondike Gold Rush, as well as the short stories "To Build a Fire", "An Odyssey of the North", and "Love of Life". He also wrote about the South Pacific in stories such as "The Pearls of Parlay", and "The Heathen".


title: Jack London

text: Jack London was born January 12, 1876. His mother, Flora Wellman, was the fifth and youngest child of Pennsylvania Canal builder Marshall Wellman and his first wife, Eleanor Garrett Jones. Marshall Wellman was descended from Thomas Wellman, an early Puritan settler in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Flora left Ohio and moved to the Pacific coast when her father remarried after her mother died. In San Francisco, Flora worked as a music teacher and spiritualist, claiming to channel the spirit of a Sauk chief, Black Hawk.


title: Jack London

text: Biographer Clarice Stasz and others believe London's father was astrologer William Chaney. Flora Wellman was living with Chaney in San Francisco when she became pregnant. Whether Wellman and Chaney were legally married is unknown. Stasz notes that in his memoirs, Chaney refers to London's mother Flora Wellman as having been "his wife"; he also cites an advertisement in which Flora called herself "Florence Wellman Chaney".


title: Jack London

text: According to Flora Wellman's account, as recorded in the "San Francisco Chronicle" of June 4, 1875, Chaney demanded that she have an abortion. When she refused, he disclaimed responsibility for the child. In desperation, she shot herself. She was not seriously wounded, but she was temporarily deranged. After giving birth, Flora sent the baby for wet-nursing to Virginia (Jennie) Prentiss, a formerly enslaved African-American woman and a neighbor. Prentiss was an important maternal figure throughout London's life, and he would later refer to her as his primary source of love and affection as a child.


title: Jack London

text: Late in 1876, Flora Wellman married John London, a partially disabled Civil War veteran, and brought her baby John, later known as Jack, to live with the newly married couple. The family moved around the San Francisco Bay Area before settling in Oakland, where London completed public grade school. The Prentiss family moved with the Londons, and remained a stable source of care for the young Jack.


title: Jack London

text: In 1897, when he was 21 and a student at the University of California, Berkeley, London searched for and read the newspaper accounts of his mother's suicide attempt and the name of his biological father. He wrote to William Chaney, then living in Chicago. Chaney responded that he could not be London's father because he was impotent; he casually asserted that London's mother had relations with other men and averred that she had slandered him when she said he insisted on an abortion. Chaney concluded by saying that he was more to be pitied than London. London was devastated by his father's letter; in the months following, he quit school at Berkeley and went to the Klondike during the gold rush boom.


title: Jack London

text: London was born near Third and Brannan Streets in San Francisco. The house burned down in the fire after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake; the California Historical Society placed a plaque at the site in 1953. Although the family was working class, it was not as impoverished as London's later accounts claimed. London was largely self-educated.


title: Jack London

text: In 1885, London found and read Ouida's long Victorian novel "Signa". He credited this as the seed of his literary success. In 1886, he went to the Oakland Public Library and found a sympathetic librarian, Ina Coolbrith, who encouraged his learning. (She later became California's first "poet laureate" and an important figure in the San Francisco literary community).


title: Jack London

text: In 1889, London began working 12 to 18 hours a day at Hickmott's Cannery. Seeking a way out, he borrowed money from his foster mother Virginia Prentiss, bought the sloop "Razzle-Dazzle" from an oyster pirate named French Frank, and became an oyster pirate himself. In his memoir, "John Barleycorn", he claims also to have stolen French Frank's mistress Mamie. After a few months, his sloop became damaged beyond repair. London hired on as a member of the California Fish Patrol.


title: Jack London

text: In 1893, he signed on to the sealing schooner "Sophie Sutherland", bound for the coast of Japan. When he returned, the country was in the grip of the panic of '93 and Oakland was swept by labor unrest. After grueling jobs in a jute mill and a street-railway power plant, London joined Coxey's Army and began his career as a tramp. In 1894, he spent 30 days for vagrancy in the Erie County Penitentiary at Buffalo, New York. In "The Road", he wrote:


title: Jack London

text: After many experiences as a hobo and a sailor, he returned to Oakland and attended Oakland High School. He contributed a number of articles to the high school's magazine, "The Aegis". His first published work was "Typhoon off the Coast of Japan", an account of his sailing experiences.


title: Jack London

text: As a schoolboy, London often studied at Heinold's First and Last Chance Saloon, a port-side bar in Oakland. At 17, he confessed to the bar's owner, John Heinold, his desire to attend university and pursue a career as a writer. Heinold lent London tuition money to attend college.


title: Jack London

text: London desperately wanted to attend the University of California, located in Berkeley. In 1896, after a summer of intense studying to pass certification exams, he was admitted. Financial circumstances forced him to leave in 1897, and he never graduated. No evidence has surfaced that he ever wrote for student publications while studying at Berkeley.


title: Jack London

text: While at Berkeley, London continued to study and spend time at Heinold's saloon, where he was introduced to the sailors and adventurers who would influence his writing. In his autobiographical novel, "John Barleycorn," London mentioned the pub's likeness seventeen times. Heinold's was the place where London met Alexander McLean, a captain known for his cruelty at sea. London based his protagonist Wolf Larsen, in the novel "The Sea-Wolf," on McLean.


title: Jack London

text: Heinold's First and Last Chance Saloon is now unofficially named Jack London's Rendezvous in his honor.


title: Jack London

text: On July 12, 1897, London (age 21) and his sister's husband Captain Shepard sailed to join the Klondike Gold Rush. This was the setting for some of his first successful stories. London's time in the harsh Klondike, however, was detrimental to his health. Like so many other men who were malnourished in the goldfields, London developed scurvy. His gums became swollen, leading to the loss of his four front teeth. A constant gnawing pain affected his hip and leg muscles, and his face was stricken with marks that always reminded him of the struggles he faced in the Klondike. Father William Judge, "The Saint of Dawson", had a facility in Dawson that provided shelter, food and any available medicine to London and others. His struggles there inspired London's short story, "To Build a Fire" (1902, revised in 1908), which many critics assess as his best.


title: Jack London

text: His landlords in Dawson were mining engineers Marshall Latham Bond and Louis Whitford Bond, educated at the Bachelor's level at the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale and at the Master's level at Stanford, respectively. The brothers' father, Judge Hiram Bond, was a wealthy mining investor. While the Bond brothers were at Stanford, Hiram at the suggestion of his brother bought the New Park Estate at Santa Clara as well as a local bank. The Bonds, especially Hiram, were active Republicans. Marshall Bond's diary mentions friendly sparring with London on political issues as a camp pastime.


title: Jack London

text: London left Oakland with a social conscience and socialist leanings; he returned to become an activist for socialism. He concluded that his only hope of escaping the work "trap" was to get an education and "sell his brains". He saw his writing as a business, his ticket out of poverty and, he hoped, as a means of beating the wealthy at their own game.


title: Jack London

text: On returning to California in 1898, London began working to get published, a struggle described in his novel "Martin Eden" (serialized in 1908, published in 1909). His first published story since high school was "To the Man On Trail", which has frequently been collected in anthologies. When "The Overland Monthly" offered him only five dollars for it—and was slow paying—London came close to abandoning his writing career. In his words, "literally and literarily I was saved" when "The Black Cat" accepted his story "A Thousand Deaths" and paid him $40—the "first money I ever received for a story".


title: Jack London

text: London began his writing career just as new printing technologies enabled lower-cost production of magazines. This resulted in a boom in popular magazines aimed at a wide public audience and a strong market for short fiction. In 1900, he made $2,500 in writing, about $ in today's currency.


title: Jack London

text: Among the works he sold to magazines was a short story known as either "Diable" (1902) or "Bâtard" (1904), two editions of the same basic story. London received $141.25 for this story on May 27, 1902. In the text, a cruel French Canadian brutalizes his dog, and the dog retaliates and kills the man. London told some of his critics that man's actions are the main cause of the behavior of their animals, and he would show this famously in another story, "The Call of the Wild".


title: Jack London

text: In early 1903, London sold "The Call of the Wild" to "The Saturday Evening Post" for $750 and the book rights to Macmillan. Macmillan's promotional campaign propelled it to swift success.


title: Jack London

text: While living at his rented villa on Lake Merritt in Oakland, California, London met poet George Sterling; in time they became best friends. In 1902, Sterling helped London find a home closer to his own in nearby Piedmont. In his letters London addressed Sterling as "Greek", owing to Sterling's aquiline nose and classical profile, and he signed them as "Wolf". London was later to depict Sterling as Russ Brissenden in his autobiographical novel "Martin Eden" (1910) and as Mark Hall in "The Valley of the Moon" (1913).


title: Jack London

text: In later life London indulged his wide-ranging interests by accumulating a personal library of 15,000 volumes. He referred to his books as "the tools of my trade".


title: Jack London

text: London married Elizabeth Mae (or May) "Bessie" Maddern on April 7, 1900, the same day "The Son of the Wolf" was published. Bess had been part of his circle of friends for a number of years. She was related to stage actresses Minnie Maddern Fiske and Emily Stevens. Stasz says, "Both acknowledged publicly that they were not marrying out of love, but from friendship and a belief that they would produce sturdy children." Kingman says, "they were comfortable together... Jack had made it clear to Bessie that he did not love her, but that he liked her enough to make a successful marriage."


title: Jack London

text: London met Bessie through his friend at Oakland High School, Fred Jacobs; she was Fred's fiancée. Bessie, who tutored at Anderson's University Academy in Alameda California, tutored Jack in preparation for his entrance exams for the University of California at Berkeley in 1896. Jacobs was killed aboard the "Scandia" in 1897, but Jack and Bessie continued their friendship, which included taking photos and developing the film together. This was the beginning of Jack's passion for photography.


title: Jack London

text: During the marriage, London continued his friendship with Anna Strunsky, co-authoring "The Kempton-Wace Letters", an epistolary novel contrasting two philosophies of love. Anna, writing "Dane Kempton's" letters, arguing for a romantic view of marriage, while London, writing "Herbert Wace's" letters, argued for a scientific view, based on Darwinism and eugenics. In the novel, his fictional character contrasted two women he had known.


title: Jack London

text: London's pet name for Bess was "Mother-Girl" and Bess's for London was "Daddy-Boy". Their first child, Joan, was born on January 15, 1901, and their second, Bessie "Becky" (also reported as Bess), on October 20, 1902. Both children were born in Piedmont, California. Here London wrote one of his most celebrated works, "The Call of the Wild."


title: Jack London

text: While London had pride in his children, the marriage was strained. Kingman says that by 1903 the couple were close to separation as they were "extremely incompatible". "Jack was still so kind and gentle with Bessie that when Cloudsley Johns was a house guest in February 1903 he didn't suspect a breakup of their marriage."


title: Jack London

text: Stasz writes that these were "code words for [Bess's] fear that [Jack] was consorting with prostitutes and might bring home venereal disease."


title: Jack London

text: On July 24, 1903, London told Bessie he was leaving and moved out. During 1904, London and Bess negotiated the terms of a divorce, and the decree was granted on November 11, 1904.


title: Jack London

text: London accepted an assignment of the "San Francisco Examiner" to cover the Russo-Japanese War in early 1904, arriving in Yokohama on January 25, 1904. He was arrested by Japanese authorities in Shimonoseki, but released through the intervention of American ambassador Lloyd Griscom. After travelling to Korea, he was again arrested by Japanese authorities for straying too close to the border with Manchuria without official permission, and was sent back to Seoul. Released again, London was permitted to travel with the Imperial Japanese Army to the border, and to observe the Battle of the Yalu.


title: Jack London

text: London asked William Randolph Hearst, the owner of the "San Francisco Examiner", to be allowed to transfer to the Imperial Russian Army, where he felt that restrictions on his reporting and his movements would be less severe. However, before this could be arranged, he was arrested for a third time in four months, this time for assaulting his Japanese assistants, whom he accused of stealing the fodder for his horse. Released through the personal intervention of President Theodore Roosevelt, London departed the front in June 1904.


title: Jack London

text: On August 18, 1904, London went with his close friend, the poet George Sterling, to "Summer High Jinks" at the Bohemian Grove. London was elected to honorary membership in the Bohemian Club and took part in many activities. Other noted members of the Bohemian Club during this time included Ambrose Bierce, Gelett Burgess, Allan Dunn, John Muir, Frank Norris, and Herman George Scheffauer.


title: Jack London

text: Beginning in December 1914, London worked on "The Acorn Planter, A California Forest Play", to be performed as one of the annual Grove Plays, but it was never selected. It was described as too difficult to set to music. London published "The Acorn Planter" in 1916.


title: Jack London

text: After divorcing Maddern, London married Charmian Kittredge in 1905. London had been introduced to Kittredge in 1900 by her aunt Netta Eames, who was an editor at "Overland Monthly" magazine in San Francisco. The two met prior to his first marriage but became lovers years later after Jack and Bessie London visited Wake Robin, Netta Eames' Sonoma County resort, in 1903. London was injured when he fell from a buggy, and Netta arranged for Charmian to care for him. The two developed a friendship, as Charmian, Netta, her husband Roscoe, and London were politically aligned with socialist causes. At some point the relationship became romantic, and Jack divorced his wife to marry Charmian, who was five years his senior.


title: Jack London

text: Biographer Russ Kingman called Charmian "Jack's soul-mate, always at his side, and a perfect match." Their time together included numerous trips, including a 1907 cruise on the yacht "Snark" to Hawaii and Australia. Many of London's stories are based on his visits to Hawaii, the last one for 10 months beginning in December 1915.


title: Jack London

text: The couple also visited Goldfield, Nevada, in 1907, where they were guests of the Bond brothers, London's Dawson City landlords. The Bond brothers were working in Nevada as mining engineers.


title: Jack London

text: London had contrasted the concepts of the "Mother Girl" and the "Mate Woman" in "The Kempton-Wace Letters." His pet name for Bess had been "Mother-Girl;" his pet name for Charmian was "Mate-Woman." Charmian's aunt and foster mother, a disciple of Victoria Woodhull, had raised her without prudishness. Every biographer alludes to Charmian's uninhibited sexuality.


title: Jack London

text: Joseph Noel calls the events from 1903 to 1905 "a domestic drama that would have intrigued the pen of an Ibsen... London's had comedy relief in it and a sort of easy-going romance." In broad outline, London was restless in his first marriage, sought extramarital sexual affairs, and found, in Charmian Kittredge, not only a sexually active and adventurous partner, but his future life-companion. They attempted to have children; one child died at birth, and another pregnancy ended in a miscarriage.


title: Jack London

text: In 1906, London published in "Collier's" magazine his eye-witness report of the San Francisco earthquake.


title: Jack London

text: In 1905, London purchased a ranch in Glen Ellen, Sonoma County, California, on the eastern slope of Sonoma Mountain. He wrote: "Next to my wife, the ranch is the dearest thing in the world to me." He desperately wanted the ranch to become a successful business enterprise. Writing, always a commercial enterprise with London, now became even more a means to an end: "I write for no other purpose than to add to the beauty that now belongs to me. I write a book for no other reason than to add three or four hundred acres to my magnificent estate."


title: Jack London

text: Stasz writes that London "had taken fully to heart the vision, expressed in his agrarian fiction, of the land as the closest earthly version of Eden ... he educated himself through the study of agricultural manuals and scientific tomes. He conceived of a system of ranching that today would be praised for its ecological wisdom." He was proud to own the first concrete silo in California. He hoped to adapt the wisdom of Asian sustainable agriculture to the United States. He hired both Italian and Chinese stonemasons, whose distinctly different styles are obvious.


title: Jack London

text: The ranch was an economic failure. Sympathetic observers such as Stasz treat his projects as potentially feasible, and ascribe their failure to bad luck or to being ahead of their time. Unsympathetic historians such as Kevin Starr suggest that he was a bad manager, distracted by other concerns and impaired by his alcoholism. Starr notes that London was absent from his ranch about six months a year between 1910 and 1916 and says, "He liked the show of managerial power, but not grinding attention to detail ... London's workers laughed at his efforts to play big-time rancher [and considered] the operation a rich man's hobby."


title: Jack London

text: London spent $80,000 ($ in current value) to build a stone mansion called Wolf House on the property. Just as the mansion was nearing completion, two weeks before the Londons planned to move in, it was destroyed by fire.


title: Jack London

text: London's last visit to Hawaii, beginning in December 1915, lasted eight months. He met with Duke Kahanamoku, Prince Jonah Kūhiō Kalaniana'ole, Queen Lili'uokalani and many others, before returning to his ranch in July 1916. He was suffering from kidney failure, but he continued to work.


title: Jack London

text: The ranch (abutting stone remnants of Wolf House) is now a National Historic Landmark and is protected in Jack London State Historic Park.


title: Jack London

text: London witnessed animal cruelty in the training of circus animals, and his subsequent novels "Jerry of the Islands" and "Michael, Brother of Jerry" included a foreword entreating the public to become more informed about this practice. In 1918, the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the American Humane Education Society teamed up to create the Jack London Club, which sought to inform the public about cruelty to circus animals and encourage them to protest this establishment. Support from Club members led to a temporary cessation of trained animal acts at Ringling-Barnum and Bailey in 1925.


title: Jack London

text: London died November 22, 1916, in a sleeping porch in a cottage on his ranch. London had been a robust man but had suffered several serious illnesses, including scurvy in the Klondike. Additionally, during travels on the "Snark", he and Charmian picked up unspecified tropical infections and diseases, including yaws. At the time of his death, he suffered from dysentery, late-stage alcoholism, and uremia; he was in extreme pain and taking morphine and opium, both common, over-the-counter drugs at the time.


title: Jack London

text: London's ashes were buried on his property not far from the Wolf House. London's funeral took place on November 26, 1916, attended only by close friends, relatives, and workers of the property. In accordance with his wishes, he was cremated and buried next to some pioneer children, under a rock that belonged to the Wolf House. After Charmian's death in 1955, she was also cremated and then buried with her husband in the same spot that her husband chose. The grave is marked by a mossy boulder. The buildings and property were later preserved as Jack London State Historic Park, in Glen Ellen, California.


title: Jack London

text: Because he was using morphine, many older sources describe London's death as a suicide, and some still do. This conjecture appears to be a rumor, or speculation based on incidents in his fiction writings. His death certificate gives the cause as uremia, following acute renal colic.


title: Jack London

text: The biographer Stasz writes, "Following London's death, for a number of reasons, a biographical myth developed in which he has been portrayed as an alcoholic womanizer who committed suicide. Recent scholarship based upon firsthand documents challenges this caricature." Most biographers, including Russ Kingman, now agree he died of uremia aggravated by an accidental morphine overdose.


title: Jack London

text: London's fiction featured several suicides. In his autobiographical memoir "John Barleycorn", he claims, as a youth, to have drunkenly stumbled overboard into the San Francisco Bay, "some maundering fancy of going out with the tide suddenly obsessed me". He said he drifted and nearly succeeded in drowning before sobering up and being rescued by fishermen. In the dénouement of "The Little Lady of the Big House", the heroine, confronted by the pain of a mortal gunshot wound, undergoes a physician-assisted suicide by morphine. Also, in "Martin Eden", the principal protagonist, who shares certain characteristics with London, drowns himself.


title: Jack London

text: London was vulnerable to accusations of plagiarism, both because he was such a conspicuous, prolific, and successful writer and because of his methods of working. He wrote in a letter to Elwyn Hoffman, "expression, you see—with me—is far easier than invention." He purchased plots and novels from the young Sinclair Lewis and used incidents from newspaper clippings as writing material.


title: Jack London

text: In July 1901, two pieces of fiction appeared within the same month: London's "Moon-Face", in the "San Francisco Argonaut," and Frank Norris' "The Passing of Cock-eye Blacklock", in "Century Magazine". Newspapers showed the similarities between the stories, which London said were "quite different in manner of treatment, [but] patently the same in foundation and motive." London explained both writers based their stories on the same newspaper account. A year later, it was discovered that Charles Forrest McLean had published a fictional story also based on the same incident.


title: Jack London

text: Egerton Ryerson Young claimed "The Call of the Wild" (1903) was taken from Young's book "My Dogs in the Northland" (1902). London acknowledged using it as a source and claimed to have written a letter to Young thanking him.


title: Jack London

text: In 1906, the "New York World" published "deadly parallel" columns showing eighteen passages from London's short story "Love of Life" side by side with similar passages from a nonfiction article by Augustus Biddle and J. K. Macdonald, titled "Lost in the Land of the Midnight Sun". London noted the "World" did not accuse him of "plagiarism", but only of "identity of time and situation", to which he defiantly "pled guilty".


title: Jack London

text: The most serious charge of plagiarism was based on London's "The Bishop's Vision", Chapter 7 of his novel "The Iron Heel" (1908). The chapter is nearly identical to an ironic essay that Frank Harris published in 1901, titled "The Bishop of London and Public Morality". Harris was incensed and suggested he should receive 1/60th of the royalties from "The Iron Heel," the disputed material constituting about that fraction of the whole novel. London insisted he had clipped a reprint of the article, which had appeared in an American newspaper, and believed it to be a genuine speech delivered by the Bishop of London.


title: Jack London

text: London was an atheist. He is quoted as saying, "I believe that when I am dead, I am dead. I believe that with my death I am just as much obliterated as the last mosquito you and I squashed."


title: Jack London

text: London wrote from a socialist viewpoint, which is evident in his novel "The Iron Heel". Neither a theorist nor an intellectual socialist, London's socialism grew out of his life experience. As London explained in his essay, "How I Became a Socialist", his views were influenced by his experience with people at the bottom of the social pit. His optimism and individualism faded, and he vowed never to do more hard physical work than necessary. He wrote that his individualism was hammered out of him, and he was politically reborn. He often closed his letters "Yours for the Revolution."


title: Jack London

text: London joined the Socialist Labor Party in April 1896. In the same year, the "San Francisco Chronicle" published a story about the twenty-year-old London's giving nightly speeches in Oakland's City Hall Park, an activity he was arrested for a year later. In 1901, he left the Socialist Labor Party and joined the new Socialist Party of America. He ran unsuccessfully as the high-profile Socialist candidate for mayor of Oakland in 1901 (receiving 245 votes) and 1905 (improving to 981 votes), toured the country lecturing on socialism in 1906, and published two collections of essays about socialism: "War of the Classes" (1905) and "Revolution, and other Essays" (1906).


title: Jack London

text: Stasz notes that "London regarded the Wobblies as a welcome addition to the Socialist cause, although he never joined them in going so far as to recommend sabotage." Stasz mentions a personal meeting between London and Big Bill Haywood in 1912.


title: Jack London

text: In his late (1913) book "The Cruise of the Snark", London writes about appeals to him for membership of the "Snark"'s crew from office workers and other "toilers" who longed for escape from the cities, and of being cheated by workmen.


title: Jack London

text: In his Glen Ellen ranch years, London felt some ambivalence toward socialism and complained about the "inefficient Italian labourers" in his employ. In 1916, he resigned from the Glen Ellen chapter of the Socialist Party, but stated emphatically he did so "because of its lack of fire and fight, and its loss of emphasis on the class struggle." In an unflattering portrait of London's ranch days, California cultural historian Kevin Starr refers to this period as "post-socialist" and says "... by 1911 ... London was more bored by the class struggle than he cared to admit."


title: Jack London

text: London shared common concerns among many European Americans in California about Asian immigration, described as "the yellow peril"; he used the latter term as the title of a 1904 essay. This theme was also the subject of a story he wrote in 1910 called "The Unparalleled Invasion". Presented as an historical essay set in the future, the story narrates events between 1976 and 1987, in which China, with an ever-increasing population, is taking over and colonizing its neighbors with the intention of taking over the entire Earth. The western nations respond with biological warfare and bombard China with dozens of the most infectious diseases. On his fears about China, he admits (at the end of "The Yellow Peril"), "it must be taken into consideration that the above postulate is itself a product of Western race-egotism, urged by our belief in our own righteousness and fostered by a faith in ourselves which may be as erroneous as are most fond race fancies."


title: Jack London

text: By contrast, many of London's short stories are notable for their empathetic portrayal of Mexican ("The Mexican"), Asian ("The Chinago"), and Hawaiian ("Koolau the Leper") characters. London's war correspondence from the Russo-Japanese War, as well as his unfinished novel "Cherry", show he admired much about Japanese customs and capabilities. London's writings have been popular among the Japanese, who believe he portrayed them positively.


title: Jack London

text: In "Koolau the Leper", London describes Koolau, who is a Hawaiian leper—and thus a very different sort of "superman" than Martin Eden—and who fights off an entire cavalry troop to elude capture, as "indomitable spiritually—a ... magnificent rebel". This character is based on Hawaiian leper Kaluaikoolau, who in 1893 revolted and resisted capture from forces of the Provisional Government of Hawaii in the Kalalau Valley.


title: Jack London

text: Those who defend London against charges of racism cite the letter he wrote to the "Japanese-American Commercial Weekly" in 1913:


title: Jack London

text: In 1996, after the City of Whitehorse, Yukon, renamed a street in honor of London, protests over London's alleged racism forced the city to change the name of "Jack London Boulevard" back to "Two-mile Hill".


title: Jack London

text: Shortly after boxer Jack Johnson was crowned the first black world heavyweight champ in 1908, London pleaded for a "great white hope" to come forward to defeat Johnson, writing: "Jim Jeffries must now emerge from his Alfalfa farm and remove that golden smile from Jack Johnson's face. Jeff, it's up to you. The White Man must be rescued."


title: Jack London

text: With other modernist writers of the day, London supported eugenics. The notion of "good breeding" complemented the Progressive era scientism, the belief that humans assort along a hierarchy by race, religion, and ethnicity. The Progressive Era catalog of inferiority offered basis for threats to American Anglo-Saxon racial integrity. London wrote to Frederick H. Robinson of the periodical "Medical Review of Reviews", stating, "I believe the future belongs to eugenics, and will be determined by the practice of eugenics." Although this led some to argue for forced sterilization of criminals or those deemed feeble-minded., London did not express this extreme. His short story "Told in the Drooling Ward" is from the viewpoint of a surprisingly astute "feebled-minded" person.


title: Jack London

text: Hensley argues that London's novel "Before Adam" (1906–07) reveals pro-eugenic themes. London advised his collaborator Anna Strunsky during preparation of "The Kempton-Wace Letters" that he would take the role of eugenics in mating, while she would argue on behalf of romantic love. (Love won the argument.) "The Valley of the Moon" emphasizes the theme of "real Americans," the Anglo Saxon, yet in "Little Lady of the Big House", London is more nuanced. The protagonist's argument is not that all white men are superior, but that there are more superior ones among whites than in other races. By encouraging the best in any race to mate will improve its population qualities. Living in Hawaii challenged his orthodoxy. In "My Hawaiian Aloha," London noted the liberal intermarrying of races, concluding how "little Hawaii, with its hotch potch races, is making a better demonstration than the United States."


title: Jack London

text: London's "strength of utterance" is at its height in his stories, and they are painstakingly well-constructed. "To Build a Fire" is the best known of all his stories. Set in the harsh Klondike, it recounts the haphazard trek of a new arrival who has ignored an old-timer's warning about the risks of traveling alone. Falling through the ice into a creek in seventy-five-below weather, the unnamed man is keenly aware that survival depends on his untested skills at quickly building a fire to dry his clothes and warm his extremities. After publishing a tame version of this story—with a sunny outcome—in "The Youth's Companion" in 1902, London offered a second, more severe take on the man's predicament in "The Century Magazine" in 1908. Reading both provides an illustration of London's growth and maturation as a writer. As Labor (1994) observes: "To compare the two versions is itself an instructive lesson in what distinguished a great work of literary art from a good children's story."


title: Jack London

text: Other stories from the Klondike period include: "All Gold Canyon", about a battle between a gold prospector and a claim jumper; "The Law of Life", about an aging American Indian man abandoned by his tribe and left to die; "Love of Life", about a trek by a prospector across the Canadian tundra; "To the Man on Trail," which tells the story of a prospector fleeing the Mounted Police in a sled race, and raises the question of the contrast between written law and morality; and "An Odyssey of the North," which raises questions of conditional morality, and paints a sympathetic portrait of a man of mixed White and Aleut ancestry.


title: Jack London

text: London was a boxing fan and an avid amateur boxer. "A Piece of Steak" is a tale about a match between older and younger boxers. It contrasts the differing experiences of youth and age but also raises the social question of the treatment of aging workers. "The Mexican" combines boxing with a social theme, as a young Mexican endures an unfair fight and ethnic prejudice to earn money with which to aid the revolution.


title: Jack London

text: Several of London's stories would today be classified as science fiction. "The Unparalleled Invasion" describes germ warfare against China; "Goliath" is about an irresistible energy weapon; "The Shadow and the Flash" is a tale about two brothers who take different routes to achieving invisibility; "A Relic of the Pliocene" is a tall tale about an encounter of a modern-day man with a mammoth. "The Red One" is a late story from a period when London was intrigued by the theories of the psychiatrist and writer Jung. It tells of an island tribe held in thrall by an extraterrestrial object.


title: Jack London

text: Some nineteen original collections of short stories were published during London's brief life or shortly after his death. There have been several posthumous anthologies drawn from this pool of stories. Many of these stories were located in the Klondike and the Pacific. A collection of "Jack London's San Francisco Stories" was published in October 2010 by Sydney Samizdat Press.


title: Jack London

text: London's most famous novels are "The Call of the Wild", "White Fang", "The Sea-Wolf", "The Iron Heel", and "Martin Eden".


title: Jack London

text: In a letter dated December 27, 1901, London's Macmillan publisher George Platt Brett, Sr., said "he believed Jack's fiction represented 'the very best kind of work' done in America."


title: Jack London

text: Critic Maxwell Geismar called "The Call of the Wild" "a beautiful prose poem"; editor Franklin Walker said that it "belongs on a shelf with "Walden" and "Huckleberry Finn""; and novelist E.L. Doctorow called it "a mordant parable ... his masterpiece."


title: Jack London

text: Some critics have said that his novels are episodic and resemble linked short stories. Dale L. Walker writes:


title: Jack London

text: Ambrose Bierce said of "The Sea-Wolf" that "the great thing—and it is among the greatest of things—is that tremendous creation, Wolf Larsen ... the hewing out and setting up of such a figure is enough for a man to do in one lifetime." However, he noted, "The love element, with its absurd suppressions, and impossible proprieties, is awful."


title: Jack London

text: "The Iron Heel" is an example of a dystopian novel that anticipates and influenced George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four". London's socialist politics are explicitly on display here. "The Iron Heel" meets the contemporary definition of soft science fiction. "The Star Rover" (1915) is also science fiction.


title: Jack London

text: London's literary executor, Irving Shepard, quoted a "Jack London Credo" in an introduction to a 1956 collection of London stories:


title: Jack London

text: I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.


title: Jack London

text: I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.


title: Jack London

text: The biographer Stasz notes that the passage "has many marks of London's style" but the only line that could be safely attributed to London was the first. The words Shepard quoted were from a story in the "San Francisco Bulletin", December 2, 1916, by journalist Ernest J. Hopkins, who visited the ranch just weeks before London's death. Stasz notes, "Even more so than today journalists' quotes were unreliable or even sheer inventions," and says no direct source in London's writings has been found. However, at least one line, according to Stasz, is authentic, being referenced by London and written in his own hand in the autograph book of Australian suffragette Vida Goldstein:


title: Jack London

text: In his short story "By The Turtles of Tasman", a character, defending her "ne'er-do-well grasshopperish father" to her "antlike uncle", says: "... my father has been a king. He has lived ... Have you lived merely to live? Are you afraid to die? I'd rather sing one wild song and burst my heart with it, than live a thousand years watching my digestion and being afraid of the wet. When you are dust, my father will be ashes."


title: Jack London

text: A short diatribe on "The Scab" is often quoted within the U.S. labor movement and frequently attributed to London. It opens:


title: Jack London

text: In 1913 and 1914, a number of newspapers printed the first three sentences with varying terms used instead of "scab", such as


title: Jack London

text: This passage as given above was the subject of a 1974 Supreme Court case, "Letter Carriers v. Austin", in which Justice Thurgood Marshall referred to it as "a well-known piece of trade union literature, generally attributed to author Jack London". A union newsletter had published a "list of scabs," which was granted to be factual and therefore not libelous, but then went on to quote the passage as the "definition of a scab". The case turned on the question of whether the "definition" was defamatory. The court ruled that "Jack London's... 'definition of a scab' is merely rhetorical hyperbole, a lusty and imaginative expression of the contempt felt by union members towards those who refuse to join", and as such was not libelous and was protected under the First Amendment.


title: Jack London

text: Despite being frequently attributed to London, the passage does not appear at all in the extensive collection of his writings at Sonoma State University's website. However, in his book "War of the Classes" he published a 1903 speech titled "The Scab", which gave a much more balanced view of the topic:


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine is one of the major European rivers. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein, Swiss-Austrian, Swiss-German borders. After that the Rhine defines much of the Franco-German border, after which it flows in a mostly northerly direction through the German Rhineland. Finally in Germany the Rhine turns into a predominantly westerly direction and flows into the Netherlands where it eventually empties into the North Sea. It drains an area of 9,973 sq km and its name derives from the Celtic "Rēnos". There are also two German states named after the river, North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate.


title: Rhine

text: It is the second-longest river in Central and Western Europe (after the Danube), at about , with an average discharge of about .


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine and the Danube comprised much of the Roman Empire's northern inland boundary, and the Rhine has been a vital navigable waterway bringing trade and goods deep inland since those days.


title: Rhine

text: The various castles and defenses built along it attest to its prominence as a waterway in the Holy Roman Empire.


title: Rhine

text: Among the largest and most important cities on the Rhine are Cologne, Rotterdam, Düsseldorf, Duisburg, Strasbourg, Nijmegen, and Basel.


title: Rhine

text: The variants of the name of the Rhine in modern languages are all derived from the Gaulish name ', which was adapted in Roman-era geography (1st century BC) as Greek ('), Latin "".


title: Rhine

text: The spelling with "Rh-" in English "Rhine" as well as in German ' and French ' is due to the influence of Greek orthography, while the vocalization "-i-" is due to the Proto-Germanic adoption of the Gaulish name as *"Rīnaz", via Old Frankish giving Old English ', Old High German ', early Middle Dutch (c. 1200) ' (then also spelled ' or ').


title: Rhine

text: The modern German diphthong ' (also used in Romansh) ' is a Central German development of the early modern period, with the Alemannic name ' keeping the older vocalism. In Alemannic, the deletion of the ending "-n" in pausa is a recent development; the form ' is largely preserved in Lucernese dialects. ' in Ripuarian is diphthongized, as is ' in Palatine. While Spanish has adopted the Germanic vocalism ', Italian, Occitan, and Portuguese have retained the Latin '.


title: Rhine

text: The Gaulish name "Rēnos" (Proto-Celtic or pre-Celtic "*Reinos") belongs to a class of river names built from the PIE root "" "to move, flow, run", also found in other names such as the Reno in Italy.


title: Rhine

text: The grammatical gender of the Celtic name (as well as of its Greek and Latin adaptation) is masculine, and the name remains masculine in German, Dutch, French, Spanish and Italian.


title: Rhine

text: The Old English river name was variously inflected as masculine or feminine; and its Old Icelandic adoption was inflected as feminine.


title: Rhine

text: The length of the Rhine is conventionally measured in "Rhine-kilometers" ("Rheinkilometer"), a scale introduced in 1939 which runs from the Old Rhine Bridge at Constance (0 km) to Hook of Holland (1036.20 km).


title: Rhine

text: The river is significantly shortened from its natural course due to a number of canalization projects completed in the 19th and 20th century. The "total length of the Rhine", to the inclusion of Lake Constance and the Alpine Rhine is more difficult to measure objectively; it was cited as by the Dutch Rijkswaterstaat in 2010.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine carries its name without distinctive accessories only from the confluence of the Rein Anteriur/Vorderrhein and Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein next to Reichenau in Tamins. Above this point is the extensive catchment of the headwaters of the Rhine. It belongs almost exclusively to the Swiss canton of Graubünden, ranging from Saint-Gotthard Massif in the west via one valley lying in Ticino and Italy in the south to the Flüela Pass in the east. The Rhine is one of the four major rivers taking their source in the Gotthard region, along with the Ticino, Rhône and Reuss.


title: Rhine

text: Traditionally, Lake Toma near the Oberalp Pass in the Gotthard region is seen as the source of the Anterior Rhine and the Rhine as a whole. The Posterior Rhine rises in the Rheinwald below the Rheinwaldhorn.


title: Rhine

text: The source of the river is generally considered north of "Lai da Tuma/Tomasee" on "Rein Anteriur/Vorderrhein", although its southern tributary "Rein da Medel" is actually longer before its confluence with the Anterior Rhine near Disentis.


title: Rhine

text: The Anterior Rhine arises from numerous source streams in the upper Surselva and flows in an easterly direction. One source is "Lai da Tuma" () with the "Rein da Tuma", which is usually indicated as source of the Rhine, flowing through it.


title: Rhine

text: Into it flow tributaries from the south, some longer, some equal in length, such as the "Rein da Medel", the "Rein da Maighels", and the "Rein da Curnera". The Cadlimo Valley in the canton of Ticino is drained by the "Reno di Medel", which crosses the geomorphologic Alpine main ridge from the south. All streams in the source area are partially, sometimes completely, captured and sent to storage reservoirs for the local hydro-electric power plants.


title: Rhine

text: The culminating point of the Anterior Rhine's drainage basin is the Piz Russein of the Tödi massif of the Glarus Alps at above sea level. It starts with the creek "Aua da Russein" (lit.: "Water of the Russein").


title: Rhine

text: In its lower course, the Anterior Rhine flows through a gorge named "Ruinaulta" (Flims Rockslide). The whole stretch of the Anterior Rhine to the Alpine Rhine confluence next to Reichenau in Tamins is accompanied by a long-distance hiking trail called "Senda Sursilvana".


title: Rhine

text: The Posterior Rhine flows first east-northeast, then north. It flows through the three valleys named Rheinwald, Schams and Domleschg-Heinzenberg. The valleys are separated by the Rofla Gorge and Viamala Gorge. Its sources are located in the Adula Alps (Rheinwaldhorn, Rheinquellhorn, and Güferhorn).


title: Rhine

text: The Avers Rhine joins from the south. One of its headwaters, the "Reno di Lei" (stowed in the Lago di Lei), is partially located in Italy.


title: Rhine

text: Near Sils the Posterior Rhine is joined by the Albula, from the east, from the Albula Pass region. The Albula draws its water mainly from the Landwasser with the Dischmabach as the largest source stream, but almost as much from the Gelgia, which comes down from the Julier Pass.


title: Rhine

text: Numerous larger and smaller tributary rivers bear the name of the "Rhine" or equivalent in various Romansh idioms like "Rein" or "Ragn". Examples:


title: Rhine

text: Next to Reichenau in Tamins the Anterior Rhine and the Posterior Rhine join and form the Alpine Rhine. The river makes a distinctive turn to the north near Chur. This section is nearly 86 km long, and descends from a height of 599 meters to 396 meters. It flows through a wide glacial Alpine valley known as the Rhine Valley (). Near Sargans a natural dam, only a few meters high, prevents it from flowing into the open Seeztal valley and then through Lake Walen and Lake Zurich into the Aare. The Alpine Rhine begins in the westernmost part of the Swiss canton of Graubünden, and later forms the border between Switzerland to the west and Liechtenstein and later Austria to the east.


title: Rhine

text: As an effect of human work, it empties into Lake Constance on Austrian territory and not on the border that follows its old natural river bed.


title: Rhine

text: The mouth of the Rhine into Lake Constance forms an inland delta. The delta is delimited in the west by the "Alter Rhein" ("Old Rhine") and in the east by a modern canalized section. Most of the delta is a nature reserve and bird sanctuary. It includes the Austrian towns of Gaißau, Höchst and Fußach. The natural Rhine originally branched into at least two arms and formed small islands by precipitating sediments. In the local Alemannic dialect, the singular is pronounced "Isel" and this is also the local pronunciation of "Esel" ("Donkey"). Many local fields have an official name containing this element.


title: Rhine

text: A regulation of the Rhine was called for, with an upper canal near Diepoldsau and a lower canal at Fußach, in order to counteract the constant flooding and strong sedimentation in the western Rhine Delta. The Dornbirner Ach had to be diverted, too, and it now flows parallel to the canalized Rhine into the lake. Its water has a darker color than the Rhine; the latter's lighter suspended load comes from higher up the mountains. It is expected that the continuous input of sediment into the lake will silt up the lake. This has already happened to the former Lake Tuggenersee.


title: Rhine

text: The cut-off Old Rhine at first formed a swamp landscape. Later an artificial ditch of about two km was dug. It was made navigable to the Swiss town of Rheineck.


title: Rhine

text: Lake Constance consists of three bodies of water: the Obersee ("upper lake"), the Untersee ("lower lake"), and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, called the Seerhein ("Lake Rhine"). The lake is situated in Germany, Switzerland and Austria near the Alps. Specifically, its shorelines lie in the German states of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, the Austrian state of Vorarlberg, and the Swiss cantons of Thurgau and St. Gallen. The Rhine flows into it from the south following the Swiss-Austrian border. It is located at approximately .


title: Rhine

text: The flow of cold, grey mountain water continues for some distance into the lake. The cold water flows near the surface and at first doesn't mix with the warmer, green waters of Upper Lake. But then, at the so-called "Rheinbrech", the Rhine water abruptly falls into the depths because of the greater density of cold water. The flow reappears on the surface at the northern (German) shore of the lake, off the island of Lindau. The water then follows the northern shore until Hagnau am Bodensee. A small fraction of the flow is diverted off the island of Mainau into Lake Überlingen. Most of the water flows via the "Constance hopper" into the "Rheinrinne" ("Rhine Gutter") and Seerhein. Depending on the water level, this flow of the Rhine water is clearly visible along the entire length of the lake.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine carries very large amounts of debris into the lake. In the mouth region, it is therefore necessary to permanently remove gravel by dredging. The large sediment loads are partly due to the extensive land improvements upstream.


title: Rhine

text: Three countries border the Obersee, namely Switzerland in the south, Austria in the southeast and the German states of Bavaria in the northeast and Baden-Württemberg in the north and northwest.


title: Rhine

text: The Seerhein is only long. It connects the Obersee with the 30 cm lower Untersee. Distance markers along the Rhine measure the distance from the bridge in the old city center of Constance.


title: Rhine

text: For most of its length, the Seerhein forms the border between Germany and Switzerland. The exception is the old city center of Constance, on the Swiss side of the river.


title: Rhine

text: The Seerhein emerged in the last thousands of years, when erosion caused the lake level to be lowered by about 10 meters. Previously, the two lakes formed a single lake, as the name still suggests.


title: Rhine

text: Like in the Obersee, the flow the Rhine can be traced in the Untersee. Here, too, the river water is hardly mixed with the lake water. The northern parts of the Untersee (Lake Zell and Gnadensee) remain virtually unaffected by the flow. The river traverses the southern, which, in isolation, is sometimes called "Rhinesee" ("Lake Rhine").


title: Rhine

text: Reichenau Island was formed at the same time as the Seerhein, when the water level fell to its current level.


title: Rhine

text: Lake Untersee is part of the border between Switzerland and Germany, with Germany on the north bank and Switzerland on the south, except both sides are Swiss in Stein am Rhein, where the High Rhine flows out of the lake.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine emerges from Lake Constance, flows generally westward, as the "Hochrhein", passes the Rhine Falls, and is joined by its major tributary, the Aare. The Aare more than doubles the Rhine's water discharge, to an average of nearly , and provides more than a fifth of the discharge at the Dutch border. The Aare also contains the waters from the summit of Finsteraarhorn, the highest point of the Rhine basin. The Rhine roughly forms the German-Swiss border from Lake Constance with the exceptions of the canton of Schaffhausen and parts of the cantons of Zürich and Basel-Stadt, until it turns north at the so-called Rhine knee at Basel, leaving Switzerland.


title: Rhine

text: The High Rhine begins in Stein am Rhein at the western end of the Untersee. Unlike the Alpine Rhine and Upper Rhine, it flows to the west. It descends from 395 m to 252 m.


title: Rhine

text: Some stretches of the High Rhine between Stein am Rhein and Eglisau form the border between Switzerland on the south bank and Germany in the north. On other stretches, both sides are Swiss; in fact most of the canton of Schaffhausen is on the north bank. Between Eglisau and Basel, the High Rhine consistently forms the border.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine Falls are situated below Schaffhausen. With an average water flow of 373 m³/s (mean summer discharge 700 m³/s) it is the largest waterfall in Europe in terms of potential energy.


title: Rhine

text: The High Rhine is characterized by numerous dams. On the few remaining natural sections, there are still several rapids.


title: Rhine

text: Near Koblenz in the canton of Aargau, the Aare joins the Rhine. With an average discharge of 557 m³/s, the Aare is more voluminous than the Rhine, which has an average discharge of 439 m³/s. Nevertheless, the Alpine Rhine is considered the main branch, because it is longer.


title: Rhine

text: In the center of Basel, the first major city in the course of the stream, is located the "Rhine knee"; this is a major bend, where the overall direction of the Rhine changes from west to north. Here the High Rhine ends. Legally, the Central Bridge is the boundary between High and Upper Rhine. The river now flows north as Upper Rhine through the Upper Rhine Plain, which is about 300 km long and up to 40 km wide. The most important tributaries in this area are the Ill below of Strasbourg, the Neckar in Mannheim and the Main across from Mainz. In Mainz, the Rhine leaves the Upper Rhine Valley and flows through the Mainz Basin.


title: Rhine

text: The southern half of the Upper Rhine forms the border between France (Alsace) and Germany (Baden-Württemberg). The northern part forms the border between the German states of Rhineland-Palatinate in the west on the one hand, and Baden-Württemberg and Hesse on the other hand, in the east and north. A curiosity of this border line is that the parts of the city of Mainz on the right bank of the Rhine were given to Hesse by the occupying forces in 1945.


title: Rhine

text: The Upper Rhine was a significant cultural landscape in Central Europe already in antiquity and during the Middle Ages. Today, the Upper Rhine area hosts many important manufacturing and service industries, particularly in the centers Basel, Strasbourg and Mannheim-Ludwigshafen. Strasbourg is the seat of the European Parliament, and so one of the three European capitals is located on the Upper Rhine.


title: Rhine

text: The Upper Rhine region was changed significantly by a Rhine straightening program in the 19th century. The rate of flow was increased and the ground water level fell significantly. Dead branches were removed by construction workers and the area around the river was made more habitable for humans on flood plains as the rate of flooding decreased sharply. On the French side, the Grand Canal d'Alsace was dug, which carries a significant part of the river water, and all of the traffic. In some places, there are large compensation pools, for example, the huge "Bassin de compensation de Plobsheim" in Alsace.


title: Rhine

text: The Upper Rhine has undergone significant human change since the 19th century. While it was slightly modified during the Roman occupation, it was not until the emergence of engineers such as Johann Gottfried Tulla that significant modernization efforts changed the shape of the river. Earlier work under Frederick the Great surrounded efforts to ease shipping and construct dams to serve coal transportation. Tulla is considered to have domesticated the Upper Rhine, a domestication that served goals such as reducing stagnant bogs that fostered waterborne diseases, making regions more habitable for human settlement, and reduce high frequency of floods. Not long before Tulla went to work on widening and straightening the river, heavy floods caused significant loss of life. Four diplomatic treaties were signed among German state governments and French regions dealing with the changes proposed along the Rhine, one was "the Treaty for the Rectification of the Rhine flow from Neuberg to Dettenheim"(1817), which surrounded states such as Bourbon France and the Bavarian Palatinate. Loops, oxbows, branches and islands were removed along the Upper Rhine so that there would be uniformity to the river. The engineering of the Rhine was not without protest, farmers and fishermen had grave concerns about valuable fishing areas and farmland being lost. While some areas lost ground, other areas saw swamps and bogs be drained and turned into arable land. Johann Tulla had the goal of shortening and straightening the Upper Rhine. Early engineering projects the Upper Rhine also had issues, with Tulla's project at one part of the river creating rapids, after the Rhine cut down from erosion to sheer rock. Engineering along the Rhine eased flooding and made transportation along the river less cumbersome. These state projects were part of the advanced and technical progress going on in the country alongside the industrial revolution. For the German state, making the river more predictable was to ensure development projects could easily commence.


title: Rhine

text: The section of the Upper Rhine downstream from Mainz is also known as the "Island Rhine". Here a number of river islands occur, locally known as "Rheinauen".


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine is the longest river in Germany. It is here that the Rhine encounters some more of its main tributaries, such as the Neckar, the Main and, later, the Moselle, which contributes an average discharge of more than . Northeastern France drains to the Rhine via the Moselle; smaller rivers drain the Vosges and Jura Mountains uplands. Most of Luxembourg and a very small part of Belgium also drain to the Rhine via the Moselle. As it approaches the Dutch border, the Rhine has an annual mean discharge of and an average width of .


title: Rhine

text: Between Bingen am Rhein and Bonn, the Middle Rhine flows through the Rhine Gorge, a formation which was created by erosion. The rate of erosion equaled the uplift in the region, such that the river was left at about its original level while the surrounding lands raised. The gorge is quite deep and is the stretch of the river which is known for its many castles and vineyards. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site (2002) and known as "the Romantic Rhine", with more than 40 castles and fortresses from the Middle Ages and many quaint and lovely country villages.


title: Rhine

text: The Mainz Basin ends in Bingen am Rhein; the Rhine continues as "Middle Rhine" into the Rhine Gorge in the Rhenish Slate Mountains. In this sections the river falls from 77.4 m above sea level to 50.4 m. On the left, is located the mountain ranges of Hunsrück and Eifel, on the right Taunus and Westerwald. According to geologists, the characteristic narrow valley form was created by erosion by the river while the surrounding landscape was lifted (see water gap).


title: Rhine

text: Major tributaries in this section are the Lahn and the Moselle. They join the Rhine near Koblenz, for the right and left respectively. Almost the entire length of the Middle Rhine runs in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate.


title: Rhine

text: The dominant economic sectors in the Middle Rhine area are viniculture and tourism. The Rhine Gorge between Rüdesheim am Rhein and Koblenz is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Near Sankt Goarshausen, the Rhine flows around the famous rock Lorelei. With its outstanding architectural monuments, the slopes full of vines, settlements crowded on the narrow river banks and scores of castles lined up along the top of the steep slopes, the Middle Rhine Valley can be considered the epitome of the Rhine romanticism.


title: Rhine

text: In Bonn, where the Sieg flows into the Rhine, the Rhine enters the North German Plain and turns into the Lower Rhine. The Lower Rhine falls from 50 m to 12 m. The main tributaries on this stretch are the Ruhr and the Lippe. Like the Upper Rhine, the Lower Rhine used to meander until engineering created a solid river bed. Because the levees are some distance from the river, at high tide the Lower Rhine has more room for widening than the Upper Rhine.


title: Rhine

text: The Lower Rhine flows through North Rhine-Westphalia. Its banks are usually heavily populated and industrialized, in particular the agglomerations Cologne, Düsseldorf and Ruhr area. Here the Rhine flows through the largest conurbation in Germany, the Rhine-Ruhr region. One of the most important cities in this region is Duisburg with the largest river port in Europe (Duisport). The region downstream of Duisburg is more agricultural. In Wesel, 30 km downstream of Duisburg, is located the western end of the second east–west shipping route, the Wesel-Datteln Canal, which runs parallel to the Lippe. Between Emmerich and Cleves the Emmerich Rhine Bridge, the longest suspension bridge in Germany, crosses the river. Near Krefeld, the river crosses the Uerdingen line, the line which separates the areas where Low German and High German are spoken.


title: Rhine

text: Until the early 1980s, industry was a major source of water pollution. Although many plants and factories can be found along the Rhine up into Switzerland, it is along the Lower Rhine that the bulk of them are concentrated, as the river passes the major cities of Cologne, Düsseldorf and Duisburg. Duisburg is the home of Europe's largest inland port and functions as a hub to the sea ports of Rotterdam, Antwerp and Amsterdam. The Ruhr, which joins the Rhine in Duisburg, is nowadays a clean river, thanks to a combination of stricter environmental controls, a transition from heavy industry to light industry and cleanup measures, such as the reforestation of Slag and brownfields. The Ruhr currently provides the region with drinking water. It contributes to the Rhine. Other rivers in the Ruhr Area, above all, the Emscher, still carry a considerable degree of pollution.


title: Rhine

text: The Dutch name for Rhine is "Rijn". The Rhine turns west and enters the Netherlands, where, together with the rivers Meuse and Scheldt, it forms the extensive Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta, with the largest river delta in Europe. Crossing the border into the Netherlands at Spijk, close to Nijmegen and Arnhem, the Rhine is at its widest, although the river then splits into three main distributaries: the Waal, Nederrijn ("Nether Rhine") and IJssel.


title: Rhine

text: From here, the situation becomes more complicated, as the Dutch name "Rijn" no longer coincides with the main flow of water. Two-thirds of the water flow volume of the Rhine flows farther west, through the Waal and then, via the Merwede and Nieuwe Merwede (De Biesbosch), merging with the Meuse, through the Hollands Diep and Haringvliet estuaries, into the North Sea. The Beneden Merwede branches off, near Hardinxveld-Giessendam and continues as the Noord, to join the Lek, near the village of Kinderdijk, to form the Nieuwe Maas; then flows past Rotterdam and continues via Het Scheur and the Nieuwe Waterweg, to the North Sea. The Oude Maas branches off, near Dordrecht, farther down rejoining the Nieuwe Maas to form Het Scheur.


title: Rhine

text: The other third of the water flows through the Pannerdens Kanaal and redistributes in the IJssel and Nederrijn. The IJssel branch carries one ninth of the water flow of the "Rhine" north into the IJsselmeer (a former bay), while the Nederrijn carries approximately two-ninths of the flow west along a route parallel to the Waal. However, at Wijk bij Duurstede, the Nederrijn changes its name and becomes the Lek. It flows farther west, to rejoin the Noord into the Nieuwe Maas and to the North Sea.


title: Rhine

text: The name "Rijn", from here on, is used only for smaller streams farther to the north, which together formed the main river Rhine in Roman times. Though they retained the name, these streams no longer carry water from the Rhine, but are used for draining the surrounding land and polders. From Wijk bij Duurstede, the old north branch of the Rhine is called Kromme Rijn ("Bent Rhine") past Utrecht, first Leidse Rijn ("Rhine of Leiden") and then, Oude Rijn ("Old Rhine"). The latter flows west into a sluice at Katwijk, where its waters can be discharged into the North Sea. This branch once formed the line along which the Limes Germanicus were built. During periods of lower sea levels within the various ice ages, the Rhine took a left turn, creating the Channel River, the course of which now lies below the English Channel.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine-Meuse Delta, the most important natural region of the Netherlands begins near Millingen aan de Rijn, close to the Dutch-German border with the division of the Rhine into Waal and Nederrijn. The region between the Dutch-German border and Rotterdam, where the Waal, Lek, and Meuse run more or less parallel, is colloquially known as the "Great Rivers". Since the Rhine contributes most of the water, the shorter term "Rhine Delta" is commonly used. However, this name is also used for the river delta where the Rhine flows into Lake Constance, so it is clearer to call the larger one "Rhine-Meuse delta", or even "Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta", as the Scheldt ends in the same delta.


title: Rhine

text: The shape of the Rhine delta is determined by two bifurcations: first, at Millingen aan de Rijn, the Rhine splits into Waal and Pannerdens Kanaal, which changes its name to Nederrijn at Angeren, and second near Arnhem, the IJssel branches off from the Nederrijn. This creates three main flows, two of which change names rather often. The largest and southern main branch begins as Waal and continues as Boven Merwede ("Upper Merwede"), Beneden Merwede ("Lower Merwede"), Noord ("the North"), Nieuwe Maas ("New Meuse"), Het Scheur ("the Rip") and Nieuwe Waterweg ("New Waterway"). The middle flow begins as Nederrijn, then changes into Lek, then joins the Noord, thereby forming Nieuwe Maas. The northern flow keeps the name IJssel until it flows into Lake IJsselmeer. Three more flows carry significant amounts of water: the Nieuwe Merwede ("New Merwede"), which branches off from the southern branch where it changes from Boven to Beneden Merwede; the Oude Maas ("Old Meuse"), which branches off from the southern branch where it changes from Beneden Merwede into Noord, and Dordtse Kil, which branches off from Oude Maas.


title: Rhine

text: Before the St. Elizabeth's flood (1421), the Meuse flowed just south of today's line Merwede-Oude Maas to the North Sea and formed an archipelago-like estuary with Waal and Lek. This system of numerous bays, estuary-like extended rivers, many islands and constant changes of the coastline, is hard to imagine today. From 1421 to 1904, the Meuse and Waal merged further upstream at Gorinchem to form Merwede. For flood protection reasons, the Meuse was separated from the Waal through a lock and diverted into a new outlet called "Bergse Maas", then Amer and then flows into the former bay Hollands Diep.


title: Rhine

text: The northwestern part of the estuary (around Hook of Holland), is still called "Maasmond" ("Meuse Mouth"), ignoring the fact that it now carries only water from the Rhine. This might explain the confusing naming of the various branches.


title: Rhine

text: The hydrography of the current delta is characterized by the delta's main arms, disconnected arms (Hollandse IJssel, Linge, Vecht, etc.) and smaller rivers and streams. Many rivers have been closed ("dammed") and now serve as drainage channels for the numerous polders. The construction of Delta Works changed the Delta in the second half of the 20th century fundamentally. Currently Rhine water runs into the sea, or into former marine bays now separated from the sea, in five places, namely at the mouths of the Nieuwe Merwede, Nieuwe Waterway (Nieuwe Maas), Dordtse Kil, Spui and IJssel.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine-Meuse Delta is a tidal delta, shaped not only by the sedimentation of the rivers, but also by tidal currents. This meant that high tide formed a serious risk because strong tidal currents could tear huge areas of land into the sea. Before the construction of the Delta Works, tidal influence was palpable up to Nijmegen, and even today, after the regulatory action of the Delta Works, the tide acts far inland. At the Waal, for example, the most landward tidal influence can be detected between Brakel and Zaltbommel.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine flows from the Alps to the North Sea Basin. The geography and geology of its present-day watershed has been developing since the Alpine orogeny began.


title: Rhine

text: In southern Europe, the stage was set in the Triassic Period of the Mesozoic Era, with the opening of the Tethys Ocean, between the Eurasian and African tectonic plates, between about 240 MBP and 220 MBP (million years before present). The present Mediterranean Sea descends from this somewhat larger Tethys sea. At about 180 MBP, in the Jurassic Period, the two plates reversed direction and began to compress the Tethys floor, causing it to be subducted under Eurasia and pushing up the edge of the latter plate in the Alpine Orogeny of the Oligocene and Miocene Periods. Several microplates were caught in the squeeze and rotated or were pushed laterally, generating the individual features of Mediterranean geography: Iberia pushed up the Pyrenees; Italy, the Alps, and Anatolia, moving west, the mountains of Greece and the islands. The compression and orogeny continue today, as shown by the ongoing raising of the mountains a small amount each year and the active volcanoes.


title: Rhine

text: In northern Europe, the North Sea Basin had formed during the Triassic and Jurassic periods and continued to be a sediment receiving basin since. In between the zone of Alpine orogeny and North Sea Basin subsidence, highlands resulting from an earlier orogeny (Variscan) remained, such as the Ardennes, Eifel and Vosges.


title: Rhine

text: From the Eocene onward, the ongoing Alpine orogeny caused a north–south rift system to develop in this zone. The main elements of this rift are the Upper Rhine Graben, in southwest Germany and eastern France and the Lower Rhine Embayment, in northwest Germany and the southeastern Netherlands. By the time of the Miocene, a river system had developed in the Upper Rhine Graben, that continued northward and is considered the first Rhine river. At that time, it did not yet carry discharge from the Alps; instead, the watersheds of the Rhone and Danube drained the northern flanks of the Alps.


title: Rhine

text: The watershed of the Rhine reaches into the Alps today, but it did not start out that way. In the Miocene period, the watershed of the Rhine reached south, only to the Eifel and Westerwald hills, about north of the Alps. The Rhine then had the Sieg as a tributary, but not yet the Moselle. The northern Alps were then drained by the Danube.


title: Rhine

text: Through stream capture, the Rhine extended its watershed southward. By the Pliocene period, the Rhine had captured streams down to the Vosges Mountains, including the Main and the Neckar. The northern Alps were then drained by the Rhone. By the early Pleistocene period, the Rhine had captured most of its current Alpine watershed from the Rhône, including the Aare. Since that time, the Rhine has added the watershed above Lake Constance (Vorderrhein, Hinterrhein, Alpenrhein; captured from the Rhône), the upper reaches of the Main, beyond Schweinfurt and the Moselle in the Vosges Mountains, captured during the Saale Ice-age from the Meuse, to its watershed.


title: Rhine

text: Around 2.5 million years ago (ending 11,600 years ago) the Ice Ages began. Since approximately 600,000 years ago, six major glacial periods have occurred, in which sea level dropped as much as and much of the continental margins were exposed. In the Early Pleistocene, the Rhine followed a course to the northwest, through the present North Sea. During the so-called Anglian glaciation (~450,000 yr BP, marine oxygen isotope stage 12), the northern part of the present North Sea was blocked by the ice and a large lake developed, that overflowed through the English Channel. This caused the Rhine's course to be diverted through the English Channel. Since then, during glacial times, the river mouth was located offshore of Brest, France and rivers, like the River Thames and the Seine, became tributaries to the Rhine. During interglacials, when sea level rose to approximately the present level, the Rhine built deltas in what is now the Netherlands.


title: Rhine

text: The most recent glacial period ran from ~74,000 (BP = Before Present), until the end of the Pleistocene (~11,600 BP). In northwest Europe, it saw two very cold phases, peaking around 70,000 BP and around 29,000–24,000 BP. The last phase slightly predates the global last ice age maximum (Last Glacial Maximum). During this time, the lower Rhine flowed roughly west through the Netherlands and extended to the southwest, through the English Channel and finally, to the Atlantic Ocean. The English Channel, the Irish Channel and most of the North Sea were dry land, mainly because sea level was approximately lower than today.


title: Rhine

text: Most of the Rhine's current course was not under the ice during the last Ice Age; although, its source must still have been a glacier. A tundra, with Ice Age flora and fauna, stretched across middle Europe, from Asia to the Atlantic Ocean. Such was the case during the Last Glacial Maximum, ca. 22,000–14,000 yr BP, when ice-sheets covered Scandinavia, the Baltics, Scotland and the Alps, but left the space between as open tundra. Loess (wind-blown topsoil dust) arose from the south and North Sea plain settling on the slopes of the Alps, Urals and the Rhine Valley, rendering the valleys facing the prevailing winds especially fertile.


title: Rhine

text: As northwest Europe slowly began to warm up from 22,000 years ago onward, frozen subsoil and expanded alpine glaciers began to thaw and fall-winter snow covers melted in spring. Much of the discharge was routed to the Rhine and its downstream extension. Rapid warming and changes of vegetation, to open forest, began about 13,000 BP. By 9000 BP, Europe was fully forested. With globally shrinking ice-cover, ocean water levels rose and the English Channel and North Sea re-inundated. Meltwater, adding to the ocean and land subsidence, drowned the former coasts of Europe transgressionally.


title: Rhine

text: About 11000 years ago, the Rhine estuary was in the Strait of Dover. There remained some dry land in the southern North Sea, known as Doggerland, connecting mainland Europe to Britain. About 9000 years ago, that last divide was overtopped / dissected. Man was already resident in the area when these events happened.


title: Rhine

text: Since 7500 years ago the situation of tides, currents and land-forms has resembled the present. Rates of sea level rise dropped such that natural sedimentation by the Rhine and coastal processes widely compensate for transgression by the sea. In the southern North Sea, due to ongoing tectonic subsidence, the coastline and sea bed are sinking at the rate of about per century (1 meter or 39 inches in last 3000 years).


title: Rhine

text: About 7000–5000 BP, a general warming encouraged migration of all former ice-locked areas, including up the Danube and down the Rhine by peoples to the east. A sudden massive expansion of the Black Sea as the Mediterranean Sea burst into it through the Bosporus may have occurred about 7500 BP.


title: Rhine

text: At the beginning of the Holocene (~11,700 years ago), the Rhine occupied its Late-Glacial valley. As a meandering river, it reworked its ice-age floodplain. As sea-level rise continued in the Netherlands, the formation of the Holocene Rhine-Meuse delta began (~8,000 years ago). Coeval absolute sea-level rise and tectonic subsidence have strongly influenced delta evolution. Other factors of importance to the shape of the delta are the local tectonic activities of the Peel Boundary Fault, the substrate and geomorphology, as inherited from the Last Glacial period and the coastal-marine dynamics, such as barrier and tidal inlet formations.


title: Rhine

text: Since ~3000 yr BP (= years Before Present), human impact is seen in the delta. As a result of increasing land clearance (Bronze Age agriculture), in the upland areas (central Germany), the sediment load of the Rhine has strongly increased and delta growth has sped up. This has caused increased flooding and sedimentation, ending peat formation in the delta. In the geologically recent past the main process distributing sediment across the delta has been the shifting of river channels to new locations on the floodplain (termed avulsion). Over the past 6000 years, approximately 80 avulsions have occurred. Direct human impact in the delta began with the mining of peat for salt and fuel from Roman times onward. This was followed by embankment of the major distributaries and damming of minor distributaries, which took place in the 11–13th century AD. Thereafter, canals were dug, bends were straightened and groynes were built to prevent the river's channels from migrating or silting up.


title: Rhine

text: At present, the branches Waal and Nederrijn-Lek discharge to the North Sea through the former Meuse estuary, near Rotterdam. The river IJssel branch flows to the north and enters the IJsselmeer (formerly the Zuider Zee), initially a brackish lagoon but a freshwater lake since 1932. The discharge of the Rhine is divided into three branches: the Waal (6/9 of total discharge), the Nederrijn – Lek (2/9 of total discharge) and the IJssel (1/9 of total discharge). This discharge distribution has been maintained since 1709 by river engineering works including the digging of the Pannerdens canal and the installation, in the 20th century, of a series of weirs on the Nederrijn.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine was not known to Herodotus and first enters the historical period in the 1st century BC in Roman-era geography. At that time, it formed the boundary between Gaul and Germania. Although it is estimated that germanic tribes have been inhabiting the area since 2000 BCE.


title: Rhine

text: The Upper Rhine had been part of the areal of the late Hallstatt culture since the 6th century BC, and by the 1st century BC, the areal of the La Tène culture covered almost its entire length, forming a contact zone with the Jastorf culture, i.e. the locus of early Celtic-Germanic cultural contact.


title: Rhine

text: In Roman geography, the Rhine formed the boundary between "Gallia" and "Germania" by definition; e.g. Maurus Servius Honoratus, "Commentary on the Aeneid of Vergil" (8.727) "(Rhenus) fluvius Galliae, qui Germanos a Gallia dividit" "(The Rhine is a) river of Gaul, which divides the Germanic people from Gaul."


title: Rhine

text: In Roman geography, the Rhine and Hercynia Silva were considered the boundary of the civilized world; as it was a wilderness, the Romans were eager to explore it. This view is typified by "Res Gestae Divi Augusti", a long public inscription of Augustus, in which he boasts of his exploits; including, sending an expeditionary fleet north of the Rheinmouth, to Old Saxony and Jutland, which he claimed no Roman had ever done before.


title: Rhine

text: Augustus ordered his stepson Roman general Drusus to establish 50 military camps along the Rhine, starting the Germanic Wars in 12 BC. At this time, the plain of the Lower Rhine was the territory of the Ubii.


title: Rhine

text: The first urban settlement, on the grounds of what is today Downtown Cologne, along the Rhine, was "Oppidum Ubiorum", which was founded in 38 BC by the Ubii. Cologne became acknowledged, as a city by the Romans in AD 50, by the name of "Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium".


title: Rhine

text: From the death of Augustus in AD 14 until after AD 70, Rome accepted as her Germanic frontier the water-boundary of the Rhine and upper Danube. Beyond these rivers she held only the fertile plain of Frankfurt, opposite the Roman border fortress of Moguntiacum (Mainz), the southernmost slopes of the Black Forest and a few scattered bridge-heads. The northern section of this frontier, where the Rhine is deep and broad, remained the Roman boundary until the empire fell. The southern part was different. The upper Rhine and upper Danube are easily crossed. The frontier which they form is inconveniently long, enclosing an acute-angled wedge of foreign territory between the modern Baden and Württemberg. The Germanic populations of these lands seem in Roman times to have been scanty, and Roman subjects from the modern Alsace-Lorraine had drifted across the river eastwards.


title: Rhine

text: The Romans kept eight legions in five bases along the Rhine. The number was reduced to four as more units were moved to the Danube. The actual number of legions present at any base or in all, depended on whether a state or threat of war existed. Between about AD 14 and 180, the assignment of legions was as follows: for the army of Germania Inferior, two legions at Vetera (Xanten), "I Germanica" and "XX Valeria" (Pannonian troops); two legions at oppidum Ubiorum ("town of the Ubii"), which was renamed to Colonia Agrippina, descending to Cologne, "V Alaudae", a Celtic legion recruited from Gallia Narbonensis and "XXI", possibly a Galatian legion from the other side of the empire.


title: Rhine

text: For the army of Germania Superior: one legion, "II Augusta", at Argentoratum (Strasbourg); and one, "XIII Gemina", at Vindonissa (Windisch). Vespasian had commanded II Augusta, before he became emperor. In addition, were a double legion, XIV and XVI, at Moguntiacum (Mainz).


title: Rhine

text: The two original military districts of Germania Inferior and Germania Superior, came to influence the surrounding tribes, who later respected the distinction in their alliances and confederations. For example, the upper Germanic peoples combined into the Alemanni. For a time, the Rhine ceased to be a border, when the Franks crossed the river and occupied Roman-dominated Celtic Gaul, as far as Paris.


title: Rhine

text: Germanic tribes crossed the Rhine in the Migration period, by the 5th century establishing the kingdoms of Francia on the Lower Rhine, Burgundy on the Upper Rhine and Alemannia on the High Rhine. This "Germanic Heroic Age" is reflected in medieval legend, such as the "Nibelungenlied" which tells of the hero Siegfried killing a dragon on the Drachenfels (Siebengebirge) ("dragons rock"), near Bonn at the Rhine and of the Burgundians and their court at Worms, at the Rhine and Kriemhild's golden treasure, which was thrown into the Rhine by Hagen.


title: Rhine

text: By the 6th century, the Rhine was within the borders of Francia. In the 9th, it formed part of the border between Middle and Western Francia, but in the 10th century, it was fully within the Holy Roman Empire, flowing through Swabia, Franconia and Lower Lorraine. The mouths of the Rhine, in the county of Holland, fell to the Burgundian Netherlands in the 15th century; Holland remained contentious territory throughout the European wars of religion and the eventual collapse of the Holy Roman Empire, when the length of the Rhine fell to the First French Empire and its client states. The Alsace on the left banks of the Upper Rhine was sold to Burgundy by Archduke Sigismund of Austria in 1469 and eventually fell to France in the Thirty Years' War. The numerous historic castles in Rhineland-Palatinate attest to the importance of the river as a commercial route.


title: Rhine

text: Since the Peace of Westphalia, the Upper Rhine formed a contentious border between France and Germany. Establishing "natural borders" on the Rhine was a long-term goal of French foreign policy, since the Middle Ages, though the language border was – and is – far more to the west. French leaders, such as Louis XIV and Napoleon Bonaparte, tried with varying degrees of success to annex lands west of the Rhine. The Confederation of the Rhine was established by Napoleon, as a French client state, in 1806 and lasted until 1814, during which time it served as a significant source of resources and military manpower for the First French Empire. In 1840, the Rhine crisis, prompted by French prime minister Adolphe Thiers desire to reinstate the Rhine as a natural border, led to a diplomatic crisis and a wave of nationalism in Germany.


title: Rhine

text: The Rhine became an important symbol in German nationalism during the formation of the German state in the 19th century (see Rhine romanticism).


title: Rhine

text: At the end of World War I, the Rhineland was subject to the Treaty of Versailles. This decreed that it would be occupied by the allies, until 1935 and after that, it would be a demilitarized zone, with the German army forbidden to enter. The Treaty of Versailles and this particular provision, in general, caused much resentment in Germany and is often cited as helping Adolf Hitler's rise to power. The allies left the Rhineland, in 1930 and the German army re-occupied it in 1936, which was enormously popular in Germany. Although the allies could probably have prevented the reoccupation, Britain and France were not inclined to do so, a feature of their policy of appeasement to Hitler.


title: Rhine

text: In World War II, it was recognized that the Rhine would present a formidable natural obstacle to the invasion of Germany, by the Western Allies. The Rhine bridge at Arnhem, immortalized in the book, "A Bridge Too Far" and the film, was a central focus of the battle for Arnhem, during the failed Operation Market Garden of September 1944. The bridges at Nijmegen, over the Waal distributary of the Rhine, were also an objective of Operation Market Garden. In a separate operation, the Ludendorff Bridge, crossing the Rhine at Remagen, became famous, when U.S. forces were able to capture it intact – much to their own surprise – after the Germans failed to demolish it. This also became the subject of a film, "The Bridge at Remagen".


title: Rhine

text: "Seven Days to the River Rhine" was a Warsaw Pact war plan for an invasion of Western Europe during the Cold War.


title: Rhine

text: Until 1932 the generally accepted length of the Rhine was . In 1932 the German encyclopedia Knaurs Lexikon stated the length as , presumably a typographical error.


title: Rhine

text: After this number was placed into the authoritative Brockhaus Enzyklopädie, it became generally accepted and found its way into numerous textbooks and official publications. The error was discovered in 2010, and the Dutch Rijkswaterstaat confirms the length at .


title: Rhine

text: During its course from the Alps to the North Sea, the Rhine passes through four countries and constitutes six different country borders. On the various parts:


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their name from the presbyterian form of church government by representative assemblies of elders. Many Reformed churches are organised this way, but the word "Presbyterian", when capitalized, is often applied to churches that trace their roots to the Church of Scotland or to English Dissenter groups that formed during the English Civil War.


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterian theology typically emphasizes the sovereignty of God, the authority of the Scriptures, and the necessity of grace through faith in Christ. Presbyterian church government was ensured in Scotland by the Acts of Union in 1707, which created the Kingdom of Great Britain. In fact, most Presbyterians found in England can trace a Scottish connection, and the Presbyterian denomination was also taken to North America, mostly by Scots and Scotch-Irish immigrants. The Presbyterian denominations in Scotland hold to the Reformed theology of John Calvin and his immediate successors, although there is a range of theological views within contemporary Presbyterianism. Local congregations of churches which use Presbyterian polity are governed by sessions made up of representatives of the congregation (elders); a conciliar approach which is found at other levels of decision-making (presbytery, synod, and general assembly). There are roughly 75 million Presbyterians in the world.


title: Presbyterianism

text: The roots of Presbyterianism lie in the Reformation of the 16th century, the example of John Calvin's Republic of Geneva being particularly influential. Most Reformed churches that trace their history back to Scotland are either presbyterian or congregationalist in government. In the twentieth century, some Presbyterians played an important role in the ecumenical movement, including the World Council of Churches. Many Presbyterian denominations have found ways of working together with other Reformed denominations and Christians of other traditions, especially in the World Communion of Reformed Churches. Some Presbyterian churches have entered into unions with other churches, such as Congregationalists, Lutherans, Anglicans, and Methodists. Presbyterians in the United States came largely from Scottish immigrants, Scots-Irish immigrants, and also from New England Yankee communities that had originally been Congregational but changed because of an agreed-upon Plan of Union of 1801 for frontier areas.


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterian tradition, particularly that of the Church of Scotland, traces its early roots to the Christian Church founded by Saint Columba, through the 6th century Hiberno-Scottish mission. Tracing their apostolic origin to Saint John, the Culdees practised Christian monasticism, a key feature of Celtic Christianity in the region, with a presbyter exercising "authority within the institution, while the different monastic institutions were independent of one another." The Church in Scotland kept the Christian feast of Easter at a date different from the See of Rome and its monks used a unique style of tonsure. The Synod of Whitby in 664, however, ended these distinctions as it ruled "that Easter would be celebrated according to the Roman date, not the Celtic date." Although Roman influence came to dominate the Church in Scotland, certain Celtic influences remained in the Scottish Church, such as "the singing of metrical psalms, many of them set to old Celtic Christianity Scottish traditional and folk tunes", which later became a "distinctive part of Scottish Presbyterian worship".


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterian history is part of the history of Christianity, but the beginning of Presbyterianism as a distinct movement occurred during the 16th-century Protestant Reformation. As the Catholic Church resisted the Reformers, several different theological movements splintered from the Church and bore different denominations. Presbyterianism was especially influenced by the French theologian John Calvin, who is credited with the development of Reformed theology, and the work of John Knox, a Scottish Catholic Priest who studied with Calvin in Geneva. He brought back Reformed teachings to Scotland. The Presbyterian church traces its ancestry back primarily to Scotland. In August 1560, the Parliament of Scotland adopted the "Scots Confession" as the creed of the Scottish Kingdom. In December 1560, the "First Book of Discipline" was published, outlining important doctrinal issues but also establishing regulations for church government, including the creation of ten ecclesiastical districts with appointed superintendents which later became known as presbyteries.


title: Presbyterianism

text: In time, the Scots Confession would be supplanted by the Westminster Confession of Faith, and the larger and shorter catechisms, which were formulated by the Westminster Assembly between 1643 and 1649.


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterians distinguish themselves from other denominations by doctrine, institutional organisation (or "church order") and worship; often using a "Book of Order" to regulate common practice and order. The origins of the Presbyterian churches are in Calvinism. Many branches of Presbyterianism are remnants of previous splits from larger groups. Some of the splits have been due to doctrinal controversy, while some have been caused by disagreement concerning the degree to which those ordained to church office should be required to agree with the Westminster Confession of Faith, which historically serves as an important confessional document – second only to the Bible, yet directing particularities in the standardisation and translation of the Bible – in Presbyterian churches.


title: Presbyterianism

text: Presbyterians place great importance upon education and lifelong learning, tempered with the belief that no human action can affect salvation.


title: Presbyterianism

text: Continuous study of the scriptures, theological writings, and understanding and interpretation of church doctrine are embodied in several statements of faith and catechisms formally adopted by various branches of the church, often referred to as "subordinate standards".


title: Presbyterianism

text: When the women with Eliza Thompson gathered to pray at a Presbyterian church in Hillsboro, Ohio, this became the birthplace of the highly influential Woman’s Temperance Crusade. Presbyterian evangelist Billy Sunday also persuaded many thousands who drank to turn to Christ instead - wanting Christ now and no more alcohol.