title: Laotian Civil War

text: The U.S. decided to counter-escalate by airdropping arms to a force of 7,000 Hmong guerrillas later in the month. The U.S. Navy transferred four H-34 helicopters to Air America.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: By the beginning of February 1961, the first four Thai pilots arrived to fly four more T-6s supplied to the Royal Laotian Air Force (RLAF). The Thai pilots had been officially discharged from the Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) and held no official position in the RLAF. The growth of the RLAF would be nullified by its casualties, as five of the T-6s were lost in action by the end of March.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: An inter-agency task force set up by the incoming Kennedy administration in early February undertook a two-month study of possible American responses to the Laotian civil war. Even as the French ended their training mission, American training efforts were ramped up: Sixteen H-34 helicopters were transferred from the U.S. Marine Corps to Air America; maintenance facilities were established at Udorn in northern Thailand, about 85 kilometres south of Vientiane. The most drastic alternative the task force envisioned was a 60,000-man commitment of American ground troops in southern Laos, with a possible use of nuclear weapons. These latter options were not elected.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 9 March, the communists captured the only road junction between Luang Prabang and Vientiane. When RLA troops were ordered to counterattack and retake the junction, they dropped their weapons and ran. Special Forces Team Moon was assigned as advisers to the RLA unit. On 22 April 1961, Team Moon was overrun. Two sergeants were killed, and team leader Captain Walter H. Moon was captured; he was later executed while trying to escape captivity. Another sergeant was released sixteen months later.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The Operation Millpond B-26s had been scheduled to strike at Kong Le, but the strike was stayed by an event on the far side of the world. The Bay of Pigs Invasion failed, and that failure gave pause to U.S. actions in Laos. A ceasefire was sought. Simultaneously, the PEO shed its civilian guise and went above ground to become a Military Advisory Assistance Group. Emblematic of the change, the Hotfoot teams donned their U.S. uniforms and became White Star Mobile Training Teams.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The truce supposedly went into effect the first week of May, but was repeatedly breached by the communists. With the Royal Lao Army ineffective, the Hmong guerrillas were left as the only opposition to the communists. In early June, they were forced from their beleaguered position at the Ban Padong by an artillery barrage followed by a ground assault. Under command of General Vang Pao, they fell back to Long Tieng.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had begun secretly recruiting Lao montagnards into 100-man militia companies. Riflemen trained for these militias would receive eight weeks basic training, then serve several months in their militia. Once they had that experience, which often included their first combat, they were further recruited into battalions of irregular troops called Special Guerrilla Units. The battalions were filled out along ethnic lines, most being Hmong, but some being Yao (Iu-Mien) or Lao Theung (Lao Saetern). SGUs, once formed up, underwent three further months training by Thai officers and sergeants in Phitsanuloke, Thailand.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: By summer, the CIA had mustered 9,000 hill tribesmen into the ranks of the Armée Clandestine. It was aided by nine CIA agents, nine Special Forces augmenters, and 99 Thai Special Forces troopers from the Police Aerial Resupply Unit.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: By autumn, the future course of American involvement was set. Paramilitary trainers would train guerrilla units, with resupply coming via airdrops, and specialized short takeoff and landing aircraft using makeshift dirt airstrips. Other trainers would try to mold the Royalist regulars into a fighting force. Fighter-bombers would serve as flying artillery to blast the communist forces into retreat or submission.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In December, the Royalists decided to assert control over the provincial capital of Nam Tha, which was on the northwestern border, almost in southern China. Laotian Army Groupement Mobiles (GMs) 11 and 18 were stationed there, and soon came under pressure from the communists.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: By February, the Royal Lao Government's hold on Nam Tha seemed tenuous enough that it was reinforced by the paratroopers of GM 15. That gave a numerical edge to the defenders and should have guaranteed Nam Tha's retention. The presence of armed American Special Forces advisors should have stiffened them with military expertise. In May, a PAVN assault broke the RLG forces and routed them. The Royalist soldiers fled southward across the entirety of northwestern Laos into Thailand, a retreat of over a hundred miles.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Faced with this fiasco, the U.S. and other foreign powers pressured the RLG into a coalition with the Pathet Lao and Kong Le's Forces Armee Neutrale. The International Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos signed on July 23, 1962 at Geneva, Switzeland as intention for the respect Laos neutrality to attempt the cessation of civil war. This technically fulfilled the Geneva Agreements on Laos and triggered the treaty requirement that foreign military technicians be withdrawn from Laos by October. The United States disbanded its Military Assistance Advisory Group and withdrew its military mission. The Vietnamese communists did not; they repatriated only a token 40 technicians out of an estimated 2,000.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: By the middle of the year, the Pathet Lao and Neutralists had begun to squabble with one another. The neutralist group was soon divided between right-leaning neutralists (headed by Kong Le) and left-leaning neutralists (headed by Quinim Polsena and Colonel Deuane Sunnalath). On 12 February 1963 Kong Le's second in command, Colonel Ketsana, was assassinated. Shortly afterwards Quinim Polsena and his deputy were also assassinated. The neutralist camp was split with some going over to the Pathēt Lao. Fighting between the Pathet Lao and government troops soon resumed.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Vang Pao gathered three SGU battalions into Groupement Mobile 21 and spearheaded a drive into Sam Neua against the Pathet Lao. His offensive was resupplied by supplies airdropped by the civilian aircraft of Air America and Bird and Sons.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In the meantime, the United States re-established a Military Assistance Advisory Group to support its efforts in Laos, basing it in Bangkok. The Requirements Office of the U.S. Embassy in Vientiane was manned by civilians and monitored the need for U.S. military aid to Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In August, the Royal Laotian Air Force received its first four T-28 Trojans that had been adapted for counter-insurgency warfare.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The irregular companies trained the previous year in Thailand were now formed into a battalion called SGU 1. Irregular forces proliferated throughout the country. In Military Regions 3 and 4, action, intelligence, and road watch teams infiltrated the Ho Chi Minh Trail.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 1 April, the USAF set up Project Waterpump, which was a pilot training program at Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base to supply Lao pilots for the Royal Laotian Air Force. The RLAF also began augmenting its ranks with Thai volunteer pilots in 1964.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Run by a 41-man team from Detachment 6 of the 1st Air Commando Wing, this facility was an end run around the treaty obligation that forbade training in Laos. Besides training pilots, Waterpump encouraged cooperation between the RLAF and the Royal Thai Air Force. It was also tasked, as a last resort, to augment the RLAF to counter a renewed Communist offensive in Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In Laos itself, there was an effort to train Laotians as forward air guides. Meantime, the Butterfly forward air control program began.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Even as the air commandos established themselves in Udorn and Laos, several Lao generals attempted a coup in Vientiane. With the capital in turmoil, the Communists on the Plain of Jars attacked and overran the Royalist and Neutralist positions. The United States then released the necessary ordnance for the RLAF to bomb Communist encampments, beginning on 18 May.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 19 May, the United States Air Force began flying mid and low-level missions over the renewed fighting, under the code name Yankee Team. They also began reconnaissance missions over the Laotian panhandle to obtain target information on men and material being moved into South Vietnam over the Ho Chi Minh Trail. By this time, the footpaths on the trail had been enlarged to truck roads, with smaller paths for bicycles and walking. The Trail had become the major artery for use by North Vietnam to infiltrate South Vietnam.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 9 June, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered an F-100 strike against the enemy in retaliation for the shoot down of another U.S. aircraft.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The summer of 1964 was marked by a successful attack by the Forces Armee Royale. Operation Triangle cleared one of the few roads in Laos; Route 13 connected the administrative capitol of Vientiane with the royal capitol of Luang Prabang.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The Plain of Jars activities expanded by December 1964, were named Operation Barrel Roll, and were under the control of the U.S. ambassador to Laos, who approved all targets before they were attacked.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: 1965 began with an event that showed how the commanding generals of the five military regions of Laos were essentially warlords of their own domains.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In February, Commanding General of Military Region 5 Kouprasith Abhay mounted a coup against the group of generals who had attempted a coup the previous year. Among the losers fleeing into exile were General Phoumi Nosavan.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 3 April, the U.S. began Operation Steel Tiger over the Laotian panhandle and the Vietnamese DMZ to locate and destroy enemy forces and materiel being moved southward at night on the Ho Chi Minh Trail into South Vietnam. However, since circumstances made it a highly complex matter in regard to the apparent neutrality of Laos, target approval had to come from the U.S. government in Washington, D.C.. Additionally, the U.S. ambassadors in South Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand were involved in controlling these U.S. air operations.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Late in 1965, the communists greatly increased their infiltration along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The United States decided to concentrate airpower upon a small segment of the Trail closest to South Vietnam and used most extensively by the enemy. As a result, Operation Tiger Hound was initiated in December 1965, utilizing aircraft from the Air Force, the United States Navy and U.S. Marines, the Vietnamese Air Force, and the Royal Laotian Air Force. On 11 December, B-52 heavy bombers were called in to this tactical operation, in their first use over Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: From 1965 to 1973, the civil war moved back and forth in northern Laos, characterized by short but often very intense engagements.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In the far northwest, Team Fox, an intelligence team of Mien hill tribesmen began long range reconnaissance of southern China.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In July, Royal Lao Government (RLG) forces seized the Nam Bac Valley. Three Infantry Regiments, one independent infantry battalion, and one artillery battalion took Nam Bac and established a defensive line north of Luang Prabang.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On the Plain of Jars, the Pathet Lao advance gradually slowed due to the destruction of its supplies by airpower, and Laotian troops then counter-attacked. By August 1966, they had advanced to within 45 miles of the DRV border. North Vietnam then sent thousands of its regular troops into the battle and once again the Laotians were forced to retreat.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: "Steel Tiger" operations continued down the length of the panhandle in 1966, with special emphasis upon the "Tiger Hound" area. Since most of the communist truck traffic was at night, the Air Force developed and began using special equipment to detect the nighttime traffic.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In eastern Laos, U.S., Royal Laotian, and VNAF aircraft continued their attacks on traffic along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. During 1967, B-52s flew 1,718 sorties in this area, almost triple their 1966 record. The major targets were trucks which had to be hunted down and destroyed one-by-one. This seemed to be irrational thinking to many Americans flying these combat missions for these trucks could have been destroyed en masse before, during, or after their unloading from the freighters that had hauled them to North Vietnam if bombing of Haiphong had been permitted. The presence of Soviet, British, Greek and Panamanian neutral ships in Haiphong prevented any United States bombing for the duration of the war.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In northern Laos, the Communists continued their slow advance across the Plain of Jars in 1967. Laotian victories were few and far between, and by the end of the year, the situation had become critical even with the air support which had been provided by the Royal Lao Air Force.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Laotian tribal irregulars were operating out of Nam Bac, under CIA direction from Luang Prabang, some 60 miles south of the guerrilla base. In midyear, over the objections of Lao colonels, American advisors pressured Royal Lao troops into forming their smaller units into combat battalions. Despite the poor training of the Lao soldiers, some of whom had never fired a weapon, these raw new units were moved northward out of Luang Prabang over a several month period to garrison Nam Bac. By mid-October, some 4,500 government troops held the valley to secure the air strip for their resupply. The American intent was the establishment of Nam Bac as the keystone of an "iron arc" of defensive positions across northern Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In response, the PAVN 316th Infantry Division was dispatched to Laos to assault Nam Bac. The Royalist garrison was soon surrounded. They had American-supplied 105 mm howitzers for artillery support. They could also call on Royal Lao Air Force T-28s for close air support. U.S. Air Force fighter-bombers struck the Communist supply lines. Communist gunfire closed the Nam Bac airstrip to fixed wing resupply. Air America copters flew in supplies and evacuated the wounded; American C-123s parachuted supplies ferried from Udorn RTAFB to the beleaguered government troops. The Royalist troops would not launch a clearing attack to regain use of the runway for resupply. On 25 December, a Vietnamese artillery barrage kicked off their offensive.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 13 January the North Vietnamese launched a multi-division attack on the Royal Lao Army at Nam Bac, Laos. Some of the government troops began withdrawing from the valley. After about a third of the defenders had retreated, the final assault on the Royalist garrison came out of a heavy mist and hit the Royalist command post. Its communications with the defenders was cut; the rout was on. The heavy weapons and scale of the PAVN attack could not be matched by the national army and it was effectively sidelined for several years.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Most of the government soldiers scattered into the surrounding hills; about 200 of the defenders were killed in action. Of the 3,278 Royalist soldiers, only about a third returned to government service. The Royalists had suffered such a staggering defeat that their army never recovered; the government was left with only tribal irregulars using guerrilla tactics fighting on its side.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Throughout 1968, the communists slowly advanced across the northern part of Laos, defeating Laotian forces time and time again. An important U.S. navigation aids site fell in the Battle of Lima Site 85 on 10 March 1968. This success was achieved despite U.S. military advice and assistance. In November, the U.S. launched an air campaign against the Ho Chi Minh Trail because North Vietnam was sending more troops and supplies than ever along this route to South Vietnam. This new operation, named Operation Commando Hunt, continued until 1972, with little success.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 23 March 1969, the Royal Lao Army launched a large attack against the communists in the Plain of Jars/Xieng Khoang areas, supported by its own air units and the U.S. Air Force (Operation Raindance). In June, Pathet Lao and PAVN launched an attack of its own and gained ground; but by August, Royal Laotian forces attacked again and regained what had been lost, recovering the Plain of Jars in September 1969 in the Kou Kiet Campaign. In all these operations, the U.S. Air Force flew hundreds of "Barrel Roll" missions; however, many were canceled because of poor weather.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Pathet Lao forces were supported by PAVN's 174th Vietnamese Volunteer Regiment. By September 1969, the 174th had to fall back to regroup. North Vietnamese forces participating in the campaign included the 316th and 312th Infantry Divisions, the 866th Infantry Regiment, the 16th Artillery Regiment, one tank company, six sapper and engineer battalions, one Nghệ An Province local force battalion, and ten PL battalions.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 11 February 1970, a PAVN and Pathet Lao offensive (part of Campaign 139) opened. By the 20th, control of the Plain of Jars was secure. RLG forces withdrew to Muong Xui. On 25 February, the RLG abandoned Xieng Khoang city. Xam Thong fell on 18 March and Long Tieng was threatened. On 25 April, the campaign ended, with PAVN forces mostly withdrawing from the Plain of Jars; according to Vietnamese sources, after the end of the campaign, the "316th Division, the 866th Regiment, and a number of specialty branch units were ordered to stay behind to work with our Lao friends."


title: Laotian Civil War

text: At the beginning of 1970, fresh troops from North Vietnam advanced through northern Laos. The Air Force called in B-52s and, on 17 February, they were used to bomb targets in northern Laos. The enemy advance was halted by Laotian reinforcements, and for the remainder of the year it was a "seesaw" military campaign.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 1 May, elements of SVN PAVN units (28th and 24A regiments) joined with North Vietnamese Army and Pathet Lao to seize Attopeu.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Although communist movements down the Ho Chi Minh Trail grew during the year, the U.S. war effort was reduced because authorities in Washington, believing the U.S. objectives in Southeast Asia were being achieved, imposed budget limits, which reduced the number of combat missions the USAF could fly.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Because of significant logistical stockpiling by PAVN in the Laotian Panhandle, South Vietnam launched Operation Lam Son 719, a military thrust on 8 February 1971. Its goals were to cross into Laos toward the city of Tchepone and cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail, hopefully thwarting a planned North Vietnamese offensive. Aerial support by the U.S. was massive since no American ground units could participate in the operation. On 25 February, PAVN launched a counterattack, and in the face of heavy opposition, the South Vietnamese force withdrew from Laos after losing approximately a third of its men.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 18 December, PAVN and Pathet Lao forces launched counteroffensive (Campaign Z) to recover the Plain. Volunteer forces included the 312th and 316th Divisions, the 335th and 866th Infantry Regiments, and six artillery and tank battalions. Xam Thong fell and the push continued toward Long Tieng.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Lower Laos – the 968th Infantry Regiment and Pathet Lao forces reclaimed the Tha Teng and Lao Nam areas, and captured the Bolaven Plateau.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: During the dry season 1971–72, PL/PAVN forces dug into defensive positions and fought for permanent control of the Plain of Jars. Units participating included the 316th Infantry Division, the 866th, 335th, and 88th Regiments, and nine specialty branch battalions under the command of Senior Colonel Le Linh. Seven PL battalions also participated.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 21 May, RLG forces attempted to seize the Plain. The battle lasted 170 days (until 15 November 1972). The communists claimed to have killed 1,200 troops and captured 80.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: When PAVN launched the "Nguyễn Huệ Offensive" (known in the West as the Easter Offensive) into South Vietnam on 30 March, massive U.S. air support was required inside South Vietnam and its air strikes in Laos dropped to their lowest point since 1965.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In northern Laos, the communists made additional gains during the year but failed to overwhelm government forces. In November, the Pathet Lao agreed to meet with Laotian government representatives to discuss a cease-fire.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The war had resulted in a large number of refugees with a peak number of 378,800 internally displaced persons under government control in October 1973.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The U.S. pulled out of Laos in 1973, as stipulated by the Paris Peace Accord. North Vietnam was not required to remove its forces under the terms of the treaty.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: During 1974 and 1975 the balance of power in Laos shifted steadily in favour of the Pathēt Lao as the U.S. disengaged itself from Indochina. Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma was tired and demoralised, and following a heart attack in mid-1974 he spent some months recuperating in France, after which he announced that he would retire from politics following the elections scheduled for early 1976.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The anti-communist forces were thus leaderless, and also divided and deeply mired in corruption. Souphanouvong, by contrast, was confident and a master political tactician, and had behind him the disciplined cadres of the communist party and the Pathēt Lao forces and the North Vietnamese army. The end of American aid also meant the mass demobilization of most of the non-Pathēt Lao military forces in the country. The Pathēt Lao on the other hand continued to be both funded and equipped by North Vietnam.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In May 1974 Souphanouvong put forward an 18-point plan for "National Reconstruction", which was unanimously adopted – a sign of his increasing dominance. The plan was mostly uncontroversial, with renewed promises of free elections, democratic rights and respect for religion, as well as constructive economic policies. But press censorship was introduced in the name of "national unity", making it more difficult for non-communist forces to organise politically in response to the creeping Pathēt Lao takeover. In January 1975 all public meetings and demonstrations were banned. Recognising the trend of events, influential business and political figures began to move their assets, and in some cases themselves, to Thailand, France or the U.S.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In March 1975 the North Vietnamese began their final military offensive in South Vietnam, which by the end of April carried them to victory with the fall of Saigon. Thirteen days earlier the Khmer Rouge army had captured Phnom Penh. The Pathēt Lao now knew that victory was within reach, and with the Vietnam War over the North Vietnamese authorised the seizure of power in Laos. Pathēt Lao forces on the Plain of Jars supported by North Vietnamese heavy artillery and other units began advancing westward.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In late April, the Pathēt Lao took the government outpost at Sala Phou Khoum crossroads which opened up Route 13 to a Pathēt Lao advance toward Muang Kassy. For the non-Pathēt Lao elements in the government, compromise seemed better than allowing what had happened in Cambodia and South Vietnam to happen in Laos. A surrender was thought to be better than a change of power by force.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In the city of Savannakhet, border at Mekong River on opposite side Thailand, several Pathet Laos underground organization members launched smaller uprising revolution against current Laotian right-wing leaders. The small uprising revolution started shortly after the enjoyable Laotian New Year festivity. Around late May 1975, after South Vietnamese government collapsed to VC, Savannakhet residents, as well as college students, joined the political rally to praise the support of new political shift toward Pathet Laos. Most of Royal Laotian troops couldn't quelled the main demonstrations. On May 31, 1975, the largely Pathet Laos troops arrived at Savannakhet without bloodshed battle at the provincial capital. Presumably, some handful Laotian residents from Savannakhet, as well as right wing political members, fled to Thailand by boat either before or during Pathet Lao swift takeover. The Pathet Lao soldiers and high-ranking officials marched north to target Vientiane as anti-monarchy protests raged in Vientiane.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Demonstrations broke out in Vientiane, denouncing the rightists and demanding political change. Rightist ministers resigned from the government and fled the country, followed by senior Royal Lao Army commanders. A Pathēt Lao minister took over the defence portfolio, removing any chance of the Army resisting the Pathēt Lao takeover. Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma, dreading further conflict and apparently trusting Souphanouvong's promises of a moderate policy, gave instructions that the Pathēt Lao were not to be resisted, and the U.S. began to withdraw its diplomatic personnel.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The Pathēt Lao army entered the major towns of southern Laos during May, and in early June occupied Luang Phrabāng. Panic broke out in Vientiane as most of the business class and many officials, officers and others who had collaborated with the U.S. scrambled to get their families and property across the Mekong to Thailand. Recognising that the cause was lost, Vang Pao led thousands of his Hmong fighters and their families into exile – eventually about a third of all the Lao Hmong left the country. Pathēt Lao forces captured Vientiane in August.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: For a few months the Pathēt Lao appeared to honour their promises of moderation. The shell of the coalition government was preserved, there were no arrests or show-trials, and private property was respected. Diplomatic relations with the U.S. were maintained, despite an immediate cut-off of all U.S. aid. (Other western countries continued to offer aid, and Soviet and eastern European technicians began to arrive to replace the departed Americans.) But in December there was a sharp change in policy. A joint meeting of the government and the Consultative Council was held, at which Souphanouvong demanded immediate change. There was no resistance. Most Western countries, including prominent long-time ally United States, closed their embassies either shortly before or after the rise of the establishment of Laos PDR claimed the new communist authoritarian government hasn't implement a new Constitution and the affliction of ideological deterioration.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In September 1975, during the interview, PM Phouma intended the wishful to stay in office until 1976 to plan the major steps on long-term reunification process to ensure the Pathet Lao does not take away some current political monarchy powers. Phouma explained about the election to have new head of state of majority assumed from Pathet Lao to create the new nonprovisional Vientiane government with the promise of retaining some liberties and potentially open more diplomatically with non-communist country Thailand.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: On 2 December when Vientiane fell to the Pathet Lao King Savang Vatthana agreed to abdicate and Souvanna Phouma resigned. The Lao People's Democratic Republic was proclaimed, with Souphanouvong as President. Kaisôn Phomvihān emerged from the shadows to become Prime Minister and the real ruler of the country. A few royal family members, such as unnamed Prince, evacuated to Thailand by means of transportation from Mekong River few days before the establishment of Laos PDR not wanting to face unpredictable society crisis. At that point, the Pathēt Lao dropped all pretense of moderation, and no more was heard of elections or political freedoms. Non-communist newspapers were closed, and a large-scale purge of the civil service, army and police was launched. Furthermore, the watchdog communist Vietnam government prevent the re-emergence of Laotian Neutralist Party (LNP) (and even other right-wing political parties and organisations) across Laos as it would perceive the upheaval chaotic crisis guessable instigated by staunch foreign "imperialists" without direct evidence. Thousands were dispatched for "re-education" in remote parts of the country, where many died and many more were kept for up to ten years. The vast majority of the royal family of Laos, including the deposed king, were also sent to the "re-education camps" and eventually after working at hard labor during the totalitarian period of the 1980s. This prompted a renewed flight from the country. "About 90 percent" of Laos's "intellectuals, technicians, and officials" left Laos following the communist takeover. Many of the professional and intellectual class, who had initially been willing to work for the new regime, changed their minds and left – a much easier thing to do from Laos than from either Vietnam or Cambodia. In proportional terms, Laos experienced the largest refugee flight of the Indochina nations with 300,000 people out of a total population of 3 million crossing the border into Thailand.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Once in power, the Pathet Lao economically cut its ties to all its neighbors (including China) with the exception of the DRV and signed a treaty of friendship with Hanoi. The treaty allowed the Vietnamese to station soldiers within Laos and to place advisers throughout the government and economy. This is considered by most historians and journalists to be the end of the Second Indochina War. Consequently, the neighboring Thailand banned any export and transit goods to Mekong River at Laos until 1989 when Thai Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan eased the trade restrictions, citing the gradual diplomatic normalcy between Thailand and Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: A dramatic event during the takeover of Laos by the communists was the evacuation of Vang Pao and other Hmong leaders by air from Long Tieng. The end came for Vang Pao on 5 May 1975 when he was called before Souvanna Phouma, the Prime Minister of Laos, and ordered to cooperate with the communist Pathet Lao. Vang Pao took the general's stars off his collar, threw them on the desk of Souvanna Phouma, and stalked out of the room. Four days later the official Pathet Lao newspaper warned that the Hmong people would be exterminated "to the last root."


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Jerry Daniels, Vang Pao's CIA case officer, was the only American remaining in Long Tieng and he began to plan an evacuation of the Hmong. However, he had only one airplane to evacuate the 3,500 Hmong leaders and families he judged to be at risk of execution by the Pathet Lao then advancing on Long Tieng. Brigadier General Heinie Aderholt in Bangkok helped to find additional planes and sent three pilots flying two C-46 and one C-130 transport aircraft to Long Tieng. The planes were "sheep-dipped" to remove any U.S. markings as the operation was carried out in secret. The pilots were American civilians: Les Strouse, Matt Hoff, and Al Rich.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: With the three American planes, the evacuation began in earnest on 13 May with each transport aircraft making four flights each that day from Long Tieng to Udorn, Thailand and transporting more than 65 people per airplane on each trip – far more than the 35 maximum passengers dictated by safety conditions at mountain-ringed Long Tieng. Thousands of Hmong clustered around the airstrip at Long Tieng awaiting evacuation and the situation became increasingly ugly. On 14 May, Vang Pao and Jerry Daniels were evacuated secretly by helicopter to Thailand and the air evacuation came to an end. The next day the Pathet Lao marched into Long Tieng unopposed. Daniels accompanied Vang Pao to exile in Montana and then returned to Thailand to help the Hmong refugees there.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: What nobody had anticipated was the tens of thousands of Hmong left behind in Long Tieng and Laos would follow Vang Pao and other Hmong leaders to Thailand. By the end of 1975 about 40,000 Hmong had succeeded to reaching Thailand, traveling on foot through the mountains and floating across the Mekong River. How many died or were killed in the attempt to escape Laos is not known, but the flight of Hmong and other Laotian highland peoples into Thailand would continue for many more years. They faced repression at home from the communist government as the price of their collaboration with the Americans. Most of the Hmong in Thailand would eventually be resettled in the United States and other countries. Between 1975 and 1982, 53,700 Hmong and other highland Laotian refugees were resettled in the United States and thousands more in other countries.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Due to the Vietnam War, the Laotian War has been almost forgotten by the majority of people around the world, even in the United States and Vietnam.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Twenty-two years following the end of the Laotian War, on 15 May 1997, the U.S. officially acknowledged its role in the Secret War. A memorial to honor American and Hmong contributions to U.S. air and ground combat efforts during the conflict was established by the Lao Veterans of America, the Center for Public Policy Analysis, in cooperation with the U.S. Congress and others. The Laos Memorial is located on the grounds of the Arlington National Cemetery between the John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: According to the Vietnamese government, from 1994 to 2012, the remains of 14,549 North Vietnamese soldiers, who were killed during the war, were found in Laos.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Many former ethnic Hmong and Laotian veterans and their families, led by Colonel Wangyee Vang of the Lao Veterans of America Institute and Lao Veterans of America, worked to establish a non-profit organization and advocate for honorary U.S. citizenship for the Secret Army veterans. In 2000, the Hmong Veterans' Naturalization Act of 2000 was passed by the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Bill Clinton.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: Many of the Hmong people came down from the mountains and surrendered to the Lao government, while others found their way to refugee camps in Thailand. In 2008, however, a repatriation agreement between the Thai and Lao governments resulted in a mass forced deportation of the people in these camps, and reports of atrocities committed against them by the Lao military spurred activist groups to try to persuade the Thai government to keep granting asylum to the refugees, but to no avail.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: In 2004, following several years of pressure from a coalition of U.S. human rights activists, the U.S. government reversed its policy of denying immigration to Hmong who had fled Laos in the 1990s for refugee camps in Thailand. In a major victory for the Hmong, the U.S. government recognized some 15,000 Hmong as political refugees and afforded them expedited U.S. immigration rights.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: The U.S. dropped 2,756,941 tons of ordnance on 113,716 Laotian sites in 230,516 sorties between 1965 and 1973 alone. By September 1969, the Plain of Jars was largely deserted.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: U.S. aircraft dropped more ordnance on Laos than on all countries during World War II, leaving Laos with about 78 million pieces of unexploded ordnance (UXO) by the end of the war. Casualties continue to mount from UXO dropped by the U.S. and Laotian Air Forces from 1964 to 1973. It has been reported that, between 1964 and 1973, areas controlled by the invading North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao were hit by an average of one B‑52 bomb-load every eight minutes, 24 hours a day. Xiangkhouang Province was the most heavily bombed province. Thirty per cent of bombs failed to explode immediately.


title: Laotian Civil War

text: UXO remains dangerous to persons coming in contact, purposefully or accidentally, with bombs. According to a Laotian government survey, casualties from explosive ordnance during the civil war period, between 1964 and 1975, are estimated at 30,000, while casualties since the end of the war from UXO are estimated at 20,000. Explosive remnants of war (ERW) caused most of the casualties, followed by landmines, and then cluster munitions which caused 15% of casualties. 59 people were known to have been killed or injured by UXO in 2006. So abundant are the remnants of bombs on the Plain of Jars that the collection and sale of scrap metal from bombs has been a major industry since the Civil War. Currently 50 people are killed or maimed every year from UXO.


title: Musical film

text: Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, but in some cases, they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate "production numbers".


title: Musical film

text: The musical film was a natural development of the stage musical after the emergence of sound film technology. Typically, the biggest difference between film and stage musicals is the use of lavish background scenery and locations that would be impractical in a theater. Musical films characteristically contain elements reminiscent of theater; performers often treat their song and dance numbers as if a live audience were watching. In a sense, the viewer becomes the diegetic audience, as the performer looks directly into the camera and performs to it.


title: Musical film

text: With the advent of sound in the late 1920s, musicals gained popularity with the public and are exemplified by the films of Busby Berkeley, a choreographer known for his distinctive and elaborate set pieces featuring multiple showgirls. These lavish production numbers are typified by his choreographic work in "42nd Street", "Gold Diggers of 1933", "Footlight Parade" (all from 1933). During the 1930s, the musical films of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers became massive cultural fixtures in the eyes of the American public. These films included, "Top Hat" (1935), "Follow the Fleet", "Swing Time" (both 1936), and "Shall We Dance" (1937). Victor Fleming's "The Wizard of Oz" (1939) would become a landmark film for movie musical as it experimented with new technology such as Technicolor.


title: Musical film

text: During the 1940s and 1950s, musical films from MGM musicals regularly premiered. These works included: "Meet Me in St. Louis" (1944), "Easter Parade" (1948), "On the Town" (1949), "An American in Paris" (1951), "Singin' in the Rain" (1952), "The Band Wagon" (1953), "High Society" (1956), and "Gigi" (1958). During this time, films outside the Arthur Freed unit at MGM included, "Holiday Inn" (1942), "White Christmas" (1954), and "Funny Face" (1957) as well as "Oklahoma!" (1955), "The King and I" (1956), "Carousel", and "South Pacific" (1958). These films of the era typically relied on the star power of such film stars as Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Ann Miller, Kathryn Grayson, and Howard Keel. They also relied on film directors such as Stanley Donen and Vincente Minnelli as well as songwriters Comden and Green, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, and the Gershwin Brothers.


title: Musical film

text: During the 1960s, films based on stage musicals continued to be critical and box-office successes. These films included, "West Side Story" (1961), "Gypsy" (1962), "The Music Man" (1962), "Bye Bye Birdie" (1963), "My Fair Lady", "Mary Poppins" (both 1964), "The Sound of Music" (1965), "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum", "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying", "Thoroughly Modern Millie" (all 1967), "Oliver!", and "Funny Girl" (both 1968). In the 1970s, film culture and the changing demographics of filmgoers placed greater emphasis on gritty realism, while the pure entertainment and theatricality of classical-era Hollywood musicals was seen as old-fashioned. Despite this, "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (1971), "Fiddler on the Roof" (1971), "Cabaret" (1972), "1776" (1972), Disney's "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" (1971), and "Pete's Dragon" (1977), as well as "Grease" and "The Wiz" (both 1978), were more traditional musicals closely adapted from stage shows and were strong successes with critics and audiences. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, musicals tended to be mainly coming from the Disney animated films of the period, from composers and lyricists, Howard Ashman, Alan Menken, and Stephen Schwartz. The Disney Renaissance started with 1989's "The Little Mermaid", then followed by "Beauty and the Beast" (1991), "Aladdin" (1992), "The Lion King" (1994), "Pocahontas" (1995), "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" (1996), "Hercules" (1997), and "Mulan" (1998).


title: Musical film

text: Since the 21st century, the musical genre was rejuvenated with darker musicals, musical biopics, musical remakes, epic drama musicals and comedy drama musicals such as "Moulin Rouge!" (2001), "Chicago" (2002), "The Phantom of the Opera" (2004), "Rent" (2005), "Dreamgirls", "Idlewild" (both 2006), "Across the Universe", "Enchanted", "Hairspray", "" (all 2007), "Mamma Mia!" (2008), "Nine" (2009), "The Muppets" (2011), "Les Misérables" (2012), "Into the Woods", "Muppets Most Wanted" (both 2014), "La La Land" (2016), "Beauty and the Beast", "The Greatest Showman" (both 2017), "Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again!", "A Star Is Born", "Mary Poppins Returns", "Bohemian Rhapsody" (all 2018), "Aladdin", "Rocketman", "The Lion King" (all 2019), "In the Heights", "Dear Evan Hansen", "Cyrano", "Tick, Tick… Boom!", and "West Side Story" (all 2021).


title: Musical film

text: The 1930s through the early 1950s are considered to be the golden age of the musical film, when the genre's popularity was at its highest in the Western world. Disney's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs", the earliest Disney animated feature film, was a musical which won an honorary Oscar for Walt Disney at the 11th Academy Awards.


title: Musical film

text: Musical short films were made by Lee de Forest in 1923–24. Beginning in 1926, thousands of Vitaphone shorts were made, many featuring bands, vocalists, and dancers. The earliest feature-length films with synchronized sound had only a soundtrack of music and occasional sound effects that played while the actors portrayed their characters just as they did in silent films: without audible dialogue. "The Jazz Singer", released in 1927 by Warner Brothers, was the first to include an audio track including non-diegetic music and diegetic music, but it had only a short sequence of spoken dialogue. This feature-length film was also a musical, featuring Al Jolson singing "Dirty Hands, Dirty Face", "Toot, Toot, Tootsie", "Blue Skies", and "My Mammy". Historian Scott Eyman wrote, "As the film ended and applause grew with the houselights, Sam Goldwyn's wife Frances looked around at the celebrities in the crowd. She saw 'terror in all their faces', she said, as if they knew that 'the game they had been playing for years was finally over'." Still, only isolated sequences featured "live" sound; most of the film had only a synchronous musical score. In 1928, Warner Brothers followed this up with another Jolson part-talkie, "The Singing Fool", which was a blockbuster hit. Theaters scrambled to install the new sound equipment and to hire Broadway composers to write musicals for the screen. The first all-talking feature, "Lights of New York", included a musical sequence in a night club. The enthusiasm of audiences was so great that in less than a year all the major studios were making sound pictures exclusively. "The Broadway Melody" (1929) had a show-biz plot about two sisters competing for a charming song-and-dance man. Advertised by MGM as the first "All-Talking, All-Singing, All-Dancing" feature film, it was a hit and won the Academy Award for Best Picture for 1929. There was a rush by the studios to hire talent from the stage to star in lavishly filmed versions of Broadway hits. "The Love Parade" (Paramount 1929) starred Maurice Chevalier and newcomer Jeanette MacDonald, written by Broadway veteran Guy Bolton.


title: Musical film

text: Warner Brothers produced the first screen operetta, "The Desert Song" in 1929. They spared no expense and photographed a large percentage of the film in Technicolor. This was followed by the first all-color, all-talking musical feature which was entitled "On with the Show" (1929). The most popular film of 1929 was the second all-color, all-talking feature which was entitled "Gold Diggers of Broadway" (1929). This film broke all box office records and remained the highest-grossing film ever produced until 1939. Suddenly, the market became flooded with musicals, revues, and operettas. The following all-color musicals were produced in 1929 and 1930 alone: "The Hollywood Revue of 1929" (1929), "The Show of Shows" (1929), "Sally" (1929), "The Vagabond King" (1930), "Follow Thru" (1930), "Bright Lights" (1930), "Golden Dawn" (1930), "Hold Everything" (1930), "The Rogue Song" (1930), "Song of the Flame" (1930), "Song of the West" (1930), "Sweet Kitty Bellairs" (1930), "Under a Texas Moon" (1930), "Bride of the Regiment" (1930), "Whoopee!" (1930), "King of Jazz" (1930), "Viennese Nights" (1930), and "Kiss Me Again" (1930). In addition, there were scores of musical features released with color sequences.


title: Musical film

text: Hollywood released more than 100 musical films in 1930, but only 14 in 1931. By late 1930, audiences had been oversaturated with musicals and studios were forced to cut the music from films that were then being released. For example, "Life of the Party" (1930) was originally produced as an all-color, all-talking musical comedy. Before it was released, however, the songs were cut out. The same thing happened to "Fifty Million Frenchmen" (1931) and "Manhattan Parade" (1932) both of which had been filmed entirely in Technicolor. Marlene Dietrich sang songs successfully in her films, and Rodgers and Hart wrote a few well-received films, but even their popularity waned by 1932. The public had quickly come to associate color with musicals and thus the decline in their popularity also resulted in a decline in color productions.


title: Musical film

text: The taste in musicals revived again in 1933 when director Busby Berkeley began to enhance the traditional dance number with ideas drawn from the drill precision he had experienced as a soldier during World War I. In films such as "42nd Street" and "Gold Diggers of 1933" (1933), Berkeley choreographed a number of films in his unique style. Berkeley's numbers typically begin on a stage but gradually transcend the limitations of theatrical space: his ingenious routines, involving human bodies forming patterns like a kaleidoscope, could never fit onto a real stage and the intended perspective is viewing from straight above.


title: Musical film

text: Musical stars such as Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were among the most popular and highly respected personalities in Hollywood during the classical era; the Fred and Ginger pairing was particularly successful, resulting in a number of classic films, such as "Top Hat" (1935), "Swing Time" (1936), and "Shall We Dance" (1937). Many dramatic actors gladly participated in musicals as a way to break away from their typecasting. For instance, the multi-talented James Cagney had originally risen to fame as a stage singer and dancer, but his repeated casting in "tough guy" roles and mob films gave him few chances to display these talents. Cagney's Oscar-winning role in "Yankee Doodle Dandy" (1942) allowed him to sing and dance, and he considered it to be one of his finest moments.


title: Musical film

text: Many comedies (and a few dramas) included their own musical numbers. The Marx Brothers' films included a musical number in nearly every film, allowing the Brothers to highlight their musical talents. Their final film, entitled "Love Happy" (1949), featured Vera-Ellen, considered to be the best dancer among her colleagues and professionals in the half century.


title: Musical film

text: Similarly, the vaudevillian comedian W. C. Fields joined forces with the comic actress Martha Raye and the young comedian Bob Hope in Paramount Pictures musical anthology "The Big Broadcast of 1938". The film also showcased the talents of several internationally recognized musical artists including: Kirsten Flagstad (Norwegian operatic soprano), Wilfred Pelletier (Canadian conductor of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra), Tito Guizar (Mexican tenor), Shep Fields conducting his Rippling Rhythm Jazz Orchestra and John Serry Sr. (Italian-American concert accordionist). In addition to the Academy Award for Best Original Song (1938), the film earned an ASCAP Film and Television Award (1989) for Bob Hope's signature song "Thanks for the Memory".


title: Musical film

text: During the late 1940s and into the early 1950s, a production unit at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer headed by Arthur Freed made the transition from old-fashioned musical films, whose formula had become repetitive, to something new. (However, they also produced Technicolor remakes of such musicals as "Show Boat", which had previously been filmed in the 1930s.) In 1939, Freed was hired as associate producer for the film "Babes in Arms". Starting in 1944 with "Meet Me in St. Louis", the Freed Unit worked somewhat independently of its own studio to produce some of the most popular and well-known examples of the genre. The products of this unit include "Easter Parade" (1948), "On the Town" (1949), "An American in Paris" (1951), "Singin' in the Rain" (1952), "The Band Wagon" (1953) and "Gigi" (1958). Non-Freed musicals from the studio included "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" in 1954 and "High Society" in 1956, and the studio distributed Samuel Goldwyn's "Guys and Dolls" in 1955.


title: Musical film

text: This era saw musical stars become household names, including Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Ann Miller, Donald O'Connor, Cyd Charisse, Mickey Rooney, Vera-Ellen, Jane Powell, Howard Keel, and Kathryn Grayson. Fred Astaire was also coaxed out of retirement for "Easter Parade" and made a permanent comeback.


title: Musical film

text: The other Hollywood studios proved themselves equally adept at tackling the genre at this time, particularly in the 1950s. Four adaptations of Rodgers and Hammerstein shows - "Oklahoma!", "The King and I", "Carousel", and "South Pacific" - were all successes, while Paramount Pictures released "White Christmas" and "Funny Face", two films which used previously written music by Irving Berlin and the Gershwins, respectively. Warner Bros. produced "Calamity Jane" and "A Star Is Born"; the former film was a vehicle for Doris Day, while the latter provided a big-screen comeback for Judy Garland, who had been out of the spotlight since 1950. Meanwhile, director Otto Preminger, better known for "message pictures", made "Carmen Jones" and "Porgy and Bess", both starring Dorothy Dandridge, who is considered the first African American A-list film star. Celebrated director Howard Hawks also ventured into the genre with "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes".


title: Musical film

text: In the 1960s, 1970s, and continuing up to today, the musical film became less of a bankable genre that could be relied upon for sure-fire hits. Audiences for them lessened and fewer musical films were produced as the genre became less mainstream and more specialized.


title: Musical film

text: In the 1960s, the critical and box-office success of the films "West Side Story", "Gypsy", "The Music Man", "Bye Bye Birdie", "My Fair Lady", "Mary Poppins", "The Sound of Music", "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum", "The Jungle Book", "Thoroughly Modern Millie", "Oliver!", and "Funny Girl" suggested that the traditional musical was in good health, while French filmmaker Jacques Demy's jazz musicals "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" and "The Young Girls of Rochefort" were popular with international critics. However popular musical tastes were being heavily affected by rock and roll and the freedom and youth associated with it, and indeed Elvis Presley made a few films that have been equated with the old musicals in terms of form, though "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help!", starring the Beatles, were more technically audacious. Most of the musical films of the 1950s and 1960s such as "Oklahoma!" and "The Sound of Music" were straightforward adaptations or restagings of successful stage productions. The most successful musicals of the 1960s created specifically for film were "Mary Poppins" and "The Jungle Book", two of Disney's biggest hits of all time.


title: Musical film

text: The phenomenal box-office performance of "The Sound of Music" gave the major Hollywood studios more confidence to produce lengthy, large-budget musicals. Despite the resounding success of some of these films, Hollywood also produced a large number of musical flops in the late 1960s and early 1970s which appeared to seriously misjudge public taste. The commercially and/or critically unsuccessful films included "Camelot", "Finian's Rainbow", "Hello Dolly!", "Sweet Charity", "Doctor Dolittle", "Half a Sixpence", "The Happiest Millionaire", "Star!", "Darling Lili", "Goodbye, Mr. Chips", "Paint Your Wagon", "Song of Norway", "On a Clear Day You Can See Forever", "Man of La Mancha", "Lost Horizon", and "Mame". Collectively and individually these failures affected the financial viability of several major studios.


title: Musical film

text: In the 1970s, film culture and the changing demographics of filmgoers placed greater emphasis on gritty realism, while the pure entertainment and theatricality of classical-era Hollywood musicals was seen as old-fashioned. Despite this, "Fiddler on the Roof" and "Cabaret" were more traditional musicals closely adapted from stage shows and were strong successes with critics and audiences. Changing cultural mores and the abandonment of the Hays Code in 1968 also contributed to changing tastes in film audiences. The 1973 film of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's "Jesus Christ Superstar" was met with some criticism by religious groups but was well received. By the mid-1970s, filmmakers avoided the genre in favor of using music by popular rock or pop bands as background music, partly in hope of selling a soundtrack album to fans. "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" was originally released in 1975 and was a critical failure until it started midnight screenings in the 1980s where it achieved cult status. 1976 saw the release of the low-budget comic musical, "The First Nudie Musical", released by Paramount. The 1978 film version of "Grease" was a smash hit; its songs were original compositions done in a 1950s pop style. However, the sequel "Grease 2" (released in 1982) bombed at the box-office. Films about performers which incorporated gritty drama and musical numbers interwoven as a diegetic part of the storyline were produced, such as "Lady Sings the Blues", "All That Jazz", and "New York, New York". Some musicals made in Britain experimented with the form, such as Richard Attenborough's "Oh! What a Lovely War" (released in 1969), Alan Parker's "Bugsy Malone" and Ken Russell's "Tommy" and "Lisztomania".


title: Musical film

text: A number of film musicals were still being made that were financially and/or critically less successful than in the musical's heyday. They include "1776", "The Wiz", "At Long Last Love", "Mame", "Man of La Mancha", "Lost Horizon"," Godspell", "Phantom of the Paradise", "Funny Lady" (Barbra Streisand's sequel to "Funny Girl"), "A Little Night Music", and "Hair" amongst others. The critical wrath against "At Long Last Love", in particular, was so strong that it was never released on home video. Fantasy musical films "Scrooge", "The Blue Bird", "The Little Prince", "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory", "Pete's Dragon", and Disney's "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" were also released in the 1970s, the latter winning the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.


title: Musical film

text: By the 1980s, financiers grew increasingly confident in the musical genre, partly buoyed by the relative health of the musical on Broadway and London's West End. Productions of the 1980s and 1990s included "The Apple", "Xanadu", "The Blues Brothers", "Annie", "Monty Python's The Meaning of Life", "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas", "Victor/Victoria", "Footloose", "Fast Forward", "A Chorus Line", "Little Shop of Horrors", "Forbidden Zone", "Absolute Beginners", "Labyrinth", "Evita", and "Everyone Says I Love You". However, "Can't Stop the Music", starring the Village People, was a calamitous attempt to resurrect the old-style musical and was released to audience indifference in 1980. "Little Shop of Horrors" was based on an off-Broadway musical adaptation of a 1960 Roger Corman film, a precursor of later film-to-stage-to-film adaptations, including "The Producers".


title: Musical film

text: Many animated films of the period – predominately from Disney – included traditional musical numbers. Howard Ashman, Alan Menken, and Stephen Schwartz had previous musical theater experience and wrote songs for animated films during this time, supplanting Disney workhorses the Sherman Brothers. Starting with 1989's "The Little Mermaid", the Disney Renaissance gave new life to the musical film. Other successful animated musicals included "Aladdin", "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", and "Pocahontas" from Disney proper, "The Nightmare Before Christmas" from Disney division Touchstone Pictures, "The Prince of Egypt" from DreamWorks, "Anastasia" from Fox and Don Bluth, and "" from Paramount. ("Beauty and the Beast" and "The Lion King" were adapted for the stage after their blockbuster success.)


title: Musical film

text: In the 21st century, movie musicals were reborn with darker musicals, musical biopics, epic drama musicals and comedy drama musicals such as "Moulin Rouge!", "Chicago", "Walk the Line", "Dreamgirls", "", "Les Misérables", "La La Land", and "West Side Story"; all of which won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy in their respective years, while such films as "The Phantom of the Opera", "Hairspray", "Mamma Mia!", "Nine", "Into the Woods", "The Greatest Showman", "Mary Poppins Returns", "Rocketman", "Cyrano", and "Tick, Tick... Boom!" were only nominated. "Chicago" was also the first musical since "Oliver!" to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards.


title: Musical film

text: Joshua Oppenheimer's Academy Award-nominated documentary "The Act of Killing" may be considered a nonfiction musical.


title: Musical film

text: One specific musical trend was the rising number of jukebox musicals based on music from various pop/rock artists on the big screen, some of which based on Broadway shows. Examples of Broadway-based jukebox musical films included "Mamma Mia!" (ABBA), "Rock of Ages", and "Sunshine on Leith" (The Proclaimers). Original ones included "Across the Universe" (The Beatles), "Moulin Rouge!" (various pop hits), "Idlewild" (Outkast) and "Yesterday" (The Beatles).


title: Musical film

text: Disney also returned to musicals with "Enchanted", "The Princess and the Frog", "Tangled", "Winnie the Pooh", "The Muppets", "Frozen", "Muppets Most Wanted", "Into the Woods", "Moana", "Mary Poppins Returns", "Frozen II", and "Encanto". Following a string of successes with live action fantasy adaptations of several of their animated features, Disney produced a live action version of "Beauty and the Beast", the first of this live action fantasy adaptation pack to be an all-out musical, and features new songs as well as new lyrics to both the Gaston number and the reprise of the title song. The second film of this live action fantasy adaptation pack to be an all-out musical was "Aladdin" and features new songs. The third film of this live action fantasy adaptation pack to be an all-out musical was "The Lion King" and features new songs. Pixar also produced "Coco", the very first computer-animated musical film by the company. Other animated musical films include "Rio", "Rio 2", "The Book of Life", "Trolls", "Sing", "Smallfoot", "UglyDolls", "Trolls World Tour", and "Sing 2".


title: Musical film

text: Biopics about music artists and showmen were also big in the 21st century. Examples include "8 Mile" (Eminem), "Ray" (Ray Charles), "Walk the Line" (Johnny Cash and June Carter), "La Vie en Rose" (Édith Piaf), "Notorious" (Biggie Smalls), "Jersey Boys" (The Four Seasons) "Love & Mercy" (Brian Wilson), "" (TLC), "" (Aaliyah), "Get on Up" (James Brown), "Whitney" (Whitney Houston), "Straight Outta Compton" (N.W.A), "The Greatest Showman" (P. T. Barnum), "Bohemian Rhapsody" (Freddie Mercury), "The Dirt" (Mötley Crüe), "Judy" (Judy Garland), and "Rocketman" (Elton John). Grossing over $900 million at the box office "Bohemian Rhapsody" is the most commercially successful musical biopic.


title: Musical film

text: Director Damien Chazelle created a musical film called "La La Land", starring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. It was meant to reintroduce the traditional jazz style of song numbers with influences from the Golden Age of Hollywood and Jacques Demy's French musicals while incorporating a contemporary/modern take on the story and characters with balances in fantasy numbers and grounded reality. It received 14 nominations at the 89th Academy Awards, tying the record for most nominations with "All About Eve" (1950) and "Titanic" (1997), and won the awards for Best Director, Best Actress, Best Cinematography, Best Original Score, Best Original Song, and Best Production Design.


title: Musical film

text: In 2013, NBC produced The Sound of Music Live! as part of their effort for expanded live entertainment events, which became an annual tradition of adaptations of stage musicals, created specifically as live television events. The following years featured Peter Pan Live!, The Wiz Live!, Hairspray Live, Jesus Christ Superstar Live!, Dr. Seuss' The Grinch Musical Live!, and Annie Live!. ABC and Fox also produced similar events including The Little Mermaid Live!, Grease Live!, A Christmas Story Live!, and Rent Live!.


title: Musical film

text: An exception to the decline of the musical film is Indian cinema, especially the Bollywood film industry based in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), where the most of films have been and still are musicals. The majority of films produced in the Tamil industry based in Chennai (formerly Madras), Sandalwood based in Bangalore, Telugu industry based in Hyderabad, and Malayalam industry are also musicals.


title: Musical film

text: Despite this exception of almost every Indian movie being a musical and India producing the most movies in the world (Formed in 1913), the first Bollywood film to be a complete musical "Dev D" (Directed by Anurag Kashyap) came in the year 2009. The second film to follow its track was "Jagga Jasoos" (Directed by Anurag Basu) in the year 2017.


title: Musical film

text: Bollywood musicals have their roots in the traditional musical theatre of India, such as classical Indian musical theatre, Sanskrit drama, and Parsi theatre. Early Bombay filmmakers combined these Indian musical theatre traditions with the musical film format that emerged from early Hollywood sound films. Other early influences on Bombay filmmakers included Urdu literature and the "Arabian Nights".


title: Musical film

text: The first Indian sound film, Ardeshir Irani's "Alam Ara" (1931), was a major commercial success. There was clearly a huge market for talkies and musicals; Bollywood and all the regional film industries quickly switched to sound filming.


title: Musical film

text: In 1937, Ardeshir Irani, of "Alam Ara" fame, made the first colour film in Hindi, "Kisan Kanya". The next year, he made another colour film, a version of "Mother India". However, colour did not become a popular feature until the late 1950s. At this time, lavish romantic musicals and melodramas were the staple fare at the cinema.


title: Musical film

text: Following India's independence, the period from the late 1940s to the early 1960s is regarded by film historians as the "Golden Age" of Hindi cinema. Some of the most critically acclaimed Hindi films of all time were produced during this period. Examples include "Pyaasa" (1957) and "Kaagaz Ke Phool" (1959) directed by Guru Dutt and written by Abrar Alvi, "Awaara" (1951) and "Shree 420" (1955) directed by Raj Kapoor and written by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, and "Aan" (1952) directed by Mehboob Khan and starring Dilip Kumar. These films expressed social themes mainly dealing with working-class life in India, particularly urban life in the former two examples; "Awaara" presented the city as both a nightmare and a dream, while "Pyaasa" critiqued the unreality of city life.


title: Musical film

text: Mehboob Khan's "Mother India" (1957), a remake of his earlier "Aurat" (1940), was the first Indian film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, which it lost by a single vote. "Mother India" was also an important film that defined the conventions of Hindi cinema for decades.


title: Musical film

text: In the 1960s and early 1970s, the industry was dominated by musical romance films with "romantic hero" leads, the most popular being Rajesh Khanna. Other actors during this period include Shammi Kapoor, Jeetendra, Sanjeev Kumar, and Shashi Kapoor, and actresses like Sharmila Tagore, Mumtaz, Saira Banu, Helen and Asha Parekh.


title: Musical film

text: By the start of the 1970s, Hindi cinema was experiencing thematic stagnation, dominated by musical romance films. The arrival of screenwriter duo Salim–Javed, consisting of Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar, marked a paradigm shift, revitalizing the industry. They began the genre of gritty, violent, Bombay underworld crime films in the early 1970s, with films such as "Zanjeer" (1973) and "Deewaar" (1975).


title: Musical film

text: The 1970s was also when the name "Bollywood" was coined, and when the quintessential conventions of commercial Bollywood films were established. Key to this was the emergence of the masala film genre, which combines elements of multiple genres (action, comedy, romance, drama, melodrama, musical). The masala film was pioneered in the early 1970s by filmmaker Nasir Hussain, along with screenwriter duo Salim-Javed, pioneering the Bollywood blockbuster format. "Yaadon Ki Baarat" (1973), directed by Hussain and written by Salim-Javed, has been identified as the first masala film and the "first" quintessentially "Bollywood" film. Salim-Javed went on to write more successful masala films in the 1970s and 1980s. Masala films launched Amitabh Bachchan into the biggest Bollywood movie star of the 1970s and 1980s. A landmark for the masala film genre was "Amar Akbar Anthony" (1977), directed by Manmohan Desai and written by Kader Khan. Manmohan Desai went on to successfully exploit the genre in the 1970s and 1980s.


title: Musical film

text: Along with Bachchan, other popular actors of this era included Feroz Khan, Mithun Chakraborty, Naseeruddin Shah, Jackie Shroff, Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor and Sunny Deol. Actresses from this era included Hema Malini, Jaya Bachchan, Raakhee, Shabana Azmi, Zeenat Aman, Parveen Babi, Rekha, Dimple Kapadia, Smita Patil, Jaya Prada and Padmini Kolhapure.


title: Musical film

text: In the late 1980s, Hindi cinema experienced another period of stagnation, with a decline in box office turnout, due to increasing violence, decline in musical melodic quality, and rise in video piracy, leading to middle-class family audiences abandoning theaters. The turning point came with "Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak" (1988), directed by Mansoor Khan, written and produced by his father Nasir Hussain, and starring his cousin Aamir Khan with Juhi Chawla. Its blend of youthfulness, wholesome entertainment, emotional quotients and strong melodies lured family audiences back to the big screen. It set a new template for Bollywood musical romance films that defined Hindi cinema in the 1990s.


title: Musical film

text: The period of Hindi cinema from the 1990s onwards is referred to as "New Bollywood" cinema, linked to economic liberalisation in India during the early 1990s. By the early 1990s, the pendulum had swung back toward family-centric romantic musicals. "Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak" was followed by blockbusters such as "Maine Pyar Kiya" (1989), "Chandni" (1989), "Hum Aapke Hain Kaun" (1994), "Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge" (1995), "Raja Hindustani" (1996), "Dil To Pagal Hai" (1997), "Pyaar To Hona Hi Tha" (1998) and "Kuch Kuch Hota Hai" (1998). A new generation of popular actors emerged, such as Aamir Khan, Aditya Pancholi, Ajay Devgan, Akshay Kumar, Salman Khan (Salim Khan's son), and Shahrukh Khan, and actresses such as Madhuri Dixit, Sridevi, Juhi Chawla, Meenakshi Seshadri, Manisha Koirala, Kajol, and Karisma Kapoor.


title: Musical film

text: Since the 1990s, the three biggest Bollywood movie stars have been the "Three Khans": Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, and Salman Khan. Combined, they have starred in most of the top ten highest-grossing Bollywood films. The three Khans have had successful careers since the late 1980s, and have dominated the Indian box office since the 1990s, across three decades.


title: Musical film

text: Baz Luhrmann stated that his successful musical film "Moulin Rouge!" (2001) was directly inspired by Bollywood musicals. The film pays homage to India, incorporating an Indian-themed play and a Bollywood-style dance sequence with a song from the film "China Gate". The critical and financial success of "Moulin Rouge!" renewed interest in the then-moribund Western live action musical genre, and subsequently films such as "Chicago", "The Producers", "Rent", "Dreamgirls", and "Hairspray" were produced, fueling a renaissance of the genre.


title: Musical film

text: "The Guru" and "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" also feature Indian-style song-and-dance sequences; the Bollywood musical "Lagaan" (2001) was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film; two other Bollywood films "Devdas" (2002) and "Rang De Basanti" (2006) were nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language; and Danny Boyle's Academy Award winning "Slumdog Millionaire" (2008) also features a Bollywood-style song-and-dance number during the film's end credits.


title: Musical film

text: Spain has a history and tradition of musical films that were made independent of Hollywood influence. The first films arise during the Second Spanish Republic of the 1930s and the advent of sound films. A few zarzuelas (Spanish operetta) were even adapted as screenplays during the silent era. The beginnings of the Spanish musical were focused on romantic Spanish archetypes: Andalusian villages and landscapes, gypsys, "bandoleros", and copla and other popular folk songs included in story development. These films had even more box-office success than Hollywood premieres in Spain. The first Spanish film stars came from the musical genre: Imperio Argentina, Estrellita Castro, Florián Rey (director) and, later, Lola Flores, Sara Montiel and Carmen Sevilla. The Spanish musical started to expand and grow. Juvenile stars appear and top the box-office. Marisol, Joselito, Pili & Mili, and Rocío Dúrcal were the major figures of musical films from 1960s to 1970s. Due to Spanish transition to democracy and the rise of "Movida culture", the musical genre fell in production and box-office, only saved by Carlos Saura and his flamenco musical films.


title: Musical film

text: Unlike the musical films of Hollywood and Bollywood, popularly identified with escapism, the Soviet musical was first and foremost a form of propaganda. Vladimir Lenin said that cinema was "the most important of the arts". His successor, Joseph Stalin, also recognized the power of cinema in efficiently spreading Communist Party doctrine. Films were widely popular in the 1920s, but it was foreign cinema that dominated the Soviet filmgoing market. Films from Germany and the U.S. proved more entertaining than Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein's historical dramas. By the 1930s it was clear that if the Soviet cinema was to compete with its Western counterparts, it would have to give audiences what they wanted: the glamour and fantasy they got from Hollywood. The musical film, which emerged at that time, embodied the ideal combination of entertainment and official ideology.


title: Musical film

text: A struggle between laughter for laughter's sake and entertainment with a clear ideological message would define the golden age of the Soviet musical of the 1930s and 1940s. Then-head of the film industry Boris Shumyatsky sought to emulate Hollywood's conveyor belt method of production, going so far as to suggest the establishment of a Soviet Hollywood.


title: Musical film

text: In 1930, the esteemed Soviet film director Sergei Eisenstein went to the United States with fellow director Grigori Aleksandrov to study Hollywood's filmmaking process. The American films greatly impacted Aleksandrov, particularly the musicals. He returned in 1932, and in 1934 directed "The Jolly Fellows", the first Soviet musical. The film was light on plot and focused more on the comedy and musical numbers. Party officials at first met the film with great hostility. Aleksandrov defended his work by arguing the notion of laughter for laughter's sake. Finally, when Aleksandrov showed the film to Stalin, the leader decided that musicals were an effective means of spreading propaganda. Messages like the importance of collective labor and rags-to-riches stories would become the plots of most Soviet musicals.


title: Musical film

text: The success of "The Jolly Fellows" ensured a place in Soviet cinema for the musical format, but immediately Shumyatsky set strict guidelines to make sure the films promoted Communist values. Shumyatsky's decree "Movies for the Millions" demanded conventional plots, characters, and montage to successfully portray Socialist Realism (the glorification of industry and the working class) on film.


title: Musical film

text: The first successful blend of a social message and entertainment was Aleksandrov's "Circus" (1936). It starred his wife, Lyubov Orlova (an operatic singer who had also appeared in "The Jolly Fellows") as an American circus performer who has to immigrate to the USSR from the U.S. because she has a mixed-race child, whom she had with a black man. Amidst the backdrop of lavish musical productions, she finally finds love and acceptance in the USSR, providing the message that racial tolerance can only be found in the Soviet Union.


title: Musical film

text: The influence of Busby Berkeley's choreography on Aleksandrov's directing can be seen in the musical number leading up to the climax. Another, more obvious reference to Hollywood is the Charlie Chaplin impersonator who provides comic relief throughout the film. Four million people in Moscow and Leningrad went to see "Circus" during its first month in theaters.


title: Musical film

text: Another of Aleksandrov's more-popular films was "The Bright Path" (1940). This was a reworking of the fairytale "Cinderella" set in the contemporary Soviet Union. The Cinderella of the story was again Orlova, who by this time was the most popular star in the USSR. It was a fantasy tale, but the moral of the story was that a better life comes from hard work. Whereas in "Circus", the musical numbers involved dancing and spectacle, the only type of choreography in "Bright Path" is the movement of factory machines. The music was limited to Orlova's singing. Here, work provided the spectacle.


title: Musical film

text: The other director of musical films was Ivan Pyryev. Unlike Aleksandrov, the focus of Pyryev's films was life on the collective farms. His films, "Tractor Drivers" (1939), "The Swineherd and the Shepherd" (1941), and his most famous, "Cossacks of the Kuban" (1949) all starred his wife, Marina Ladynina. Like in Aleksandrov's "Bright Path", the only choreography was the work the characters were doing on film. Even the songs were about the joys of working.


title: Musical film

text: Rather than having a specific message for any of his films, Pyryev promoted Stalin's slogan "life has become better, life has become more joyous." Sometimes this message was in stark contrast with the reality of the time. During the filming of "Cossacks of the Kuban", the Soviet Union was going through a postwar famine. In reality, the actors who were singing about a time of prosperity were hungry and malnourished. The films did, however, provide escapism and optimism for the viewing public.


title: Musical film

text: The most popular film of the brief era of Stalinist musicals was Alexandrov's 1938 film "Volga-Volga". The star, again, was Lyubov Orlova and the film featured singing and dancing, having nothing to do with work. It is the most unusual of its type. The plot surrounds a love story between two individuals who want to play music. They are unrepresentative of Soviet values in that their focus is more on their music than their jobs. The gags poke fun at the local authorities and bureaucracy. There is no glorification of industry since it takes place in a small rural village. Work is not glorified either, since the plot revolves around a group of villagers using their vacation time to go on a trip up the Volga and Moscow Canal to perform in Moscow. The film can be seen as a glorification of Moscow canal without any hint that the canal was built by Gulag prisoners.


title: Musical film

text: "Volga-Volga" followed the aesthetic principles of Socialist Realism rather than the ideological tenets. It became Stalin's favorite film and he gave it as a gift to President Roosevelt during WWII. It is another example of one of the films that claimed life is better. Released at the height of Stalin's purges, it provided escapism and a comforting illusion for the public.


title: John Knox

text: John Knox () (born – 24 November 1572) was a Scottish minister, Reformed theologian, and writer who was a leader of the country's Reformation. He was the founder of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland.


title: John Knox

text: Born in Giffordgate, a street in Haddington, East Lothian, Knox is believed to have been educated at the University of St Andrews and worked as a notary-priest. Influenced by early church reformers such as George Wishart, he joined the movement to reform the Scottish church. He was caught up in the and political events that involved the murder of Cardinal David Beaton in 1546 and the intervention of the regent Mary of Guise. He was taken prisoner by French forces the following year and exiled to England on his release in 1549.


title: John Knox

text: While in exile, Knox was licensed to work in the Church of England, where he rose in the ranks to serve King Edward VI of England as a royal chaplain. He exerted a reforming influence on the text of the "Book of Common Prayer". In England, he met and married his first wife, Margery Bowes. When Mary I ascended the throne of England and re-established Catholicism, Knox was forced to resign his position and leave the country. Knox moved to Geneva and then to Frankfurt. In Geneva, he met John Calvin, from whom he gained experience and knowledge of Reformed theology and Presbyterian polity. He created a new order of service, which was eventually adopted by the reformed church in Scotland. He left Geneva to head the English refugee church in Frankfurt but he was forced to leave over differences concerning the liturgy, thus ending his association with the Church of England. The University of Edinburgh Heritage Collection holds a copy of Knox's Liturgy, translated into Scots Gaelic by John Carswell. It is the first book printed in any Gaelic language.


title: John Knox

text: On his return to Scotland, Knox led the Protestant Reformation in Scotland, in partnership with the Scottish Protestant nobility. The movement may be seen as a revolution since it led to the ousting of Mary of Guise, who governed the country in the name of her young daughter Mary, Queen of Scots. Knox helped write the new confession of faith and the ecclesiastical order for the newly created reformed church, the Kirk. He wrote his five-volume "The History of the Reformation in Scotland" between 1559 and 1566. He continued to serve as the religious leader of the Protestants throughout Mary's reign. In several interviews with the Queen, Knox admonished her for supporting Catholic practices. After she was imprisoned for her alleged role in the murder of her husband Lord Darnley, and King James VI was enthroned in her stead, Knox openly called for her execution. He continued to preach until his final days.


title: John Knox

text: John Knox was born sometime between 1505 and 1515 in or near Haddington, the county town of East Lothian. His father, William Knox, was a merchant. All that is known of his mother is that her maiden name was Sinclair and that she died when John Knox was a child. Their eldest son, William, carried on his father's business, which helped in Knox's international communications.


title: John Knox

text: Knox was probably educated at the grammar school in Haddington. At this time, the priesthood was the only path for those whose inclinations were academic rather than mercantile or agricultural. He proceeded to further studies at the University of St Andrews or possibly at the University of Glasgow. He studied under John Major, one of the greatest scholars of the time. Knox was ordained a Catholic priest in Edinburgh on Easter Eve of 1536 by William Chisholm, Bishop of Dunblane.


title: John Knox

text: Knox first appears in public records as a priest and a notary in 1540. He was still serving in these capacities as late as 1543 when he described himself as a "minister of the sacred altar in the diocese of St. Andrews, notary by apostolic authority" in a notarial deed dated 27 March. Rather than taking up parochial duties in a parish, he became tutor to two sons of Hugh Douglas of Longniddry. He also taught the son of John Cockburn of Ormiston. Both of these lairds had embraced the new religious ideas of the Reformation.


title: John Knox

text: Knox did not record when or how he was converted to the Protestant faith, but perhaps the key formative influences on Knox were Patrick Hamilton and George Wishart. Wishart was a reformer who had fled Scotland in 1538 to escape punishment for heresy. He first moved to England, where in Bristol he preached against the veneration of the Virgin Mary. He was forced to make a public recantation and was burned in effigy at the Church of St Nicholas as a sign of his abjuration. He then took refuge in Germany and Switzerland. While on the Continent, he translated the First Helvetic Confession into English. He returned to Scotland in 1544, but the timing of his return was unfortunate. In December 1543, James Hamilton, Duke of Châtellerault, the appointed regent for the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, had decided with the Queen Mother, Mary of Guise, and Cardinal David Beaton to persecute the Protestant sect that had taken root in Scotland. Wishart travelled throughout Scotland preaching in favour of the reformation and when he arrived in East Lothian, Knox became one of his closest associates. Knox acted as his bodyguard, bearing a two-handed sword in order to defend him. In December 1545, Wishart was seized on Beaton's orders by the Earl of Bothwell and taken to the Castle of St Andrews. Knox was present on the night of Wishart's arrest and was prepared to follow him into captivity, but Wishart persuaded him against this course saying, "Nay, return to your bairns [children] and God bless you. One is sufficient for a sacrifice." Wishart was subsequently prosecuted by Beaton's Public Accuser of Heretics, Archdeacon John Lauder. On 1 March 1546, he was burnt at the stake in the presence of Beaton.


title: John Knox

text: Knox had avoided being arrested by Lord Bothwell through Wishart's advice to return to tutoring. He took shelter with Douglas in Longniddry. Several months later he was still in charge of the pupils, the sons of Douglas and Cockburn, who wearied of moving from place to place while being pursued. He toyed with the idea of fleeing to Germany and taking his pupils with him. While Knox remained a fugitive, Beaton was murdered on 29 May 1546, within his residence, the Castle of St Andrews, by a gang of five persons in revenge for Wishart's execution. The assassins seized the castle and eventually their families and friends took refuge with them, about a hundred and fifty men in all. Among their friends was Henry Balnaves, a former secretary of state in the government, who negotiated with England for the financial support of the rebels. Douglas and Cockburn suggested to Knox to take their sons to the relative safety of the castle to continue their instruction in reformed doctrine, and Knox arrived at the castle on 10 April 1547.


title: John Knox

text: Knox's powers as a preacher came to the attention of the chaplain of the garrison, John Rough. While Rough was preaching in the parish church on the Protestant principle of the popular election of a pastor, he proposed Knox to the congregation for that office. Knox did not relish the idea. According to his own account, he burst into tears and fled to his room. Within a week, however, he was giving his first sermon to a congregation that included his old teacher, John Major. He expounded on the seventh chapter of the Book of Daniel, comparing the Pope with the Antichrist. His sermon was marked by his consideration of the Bible as his sole authority and the doctrine of justification by faith alone, two elements that would remain in his thoughts throughout the rest of his life. A few days later, a debate was staged that allowed him to lay down additional theses including the rejection of the Mass, Purgatory, and prayers for the dead.


title: John Knox

text: John Knox's chaplaincy of the castle garrison was not to last long. While Hamilton was willing to negotiate with England to stop their support of the rebels and bring the castle back under his control, Mary of Guise decided that it could be taken only by force and requested the king of France, Henry II to intervene. On 29 June 1547, 21 French galleys approached St Andrews under the command of Leone Strozzi, prior of Capua. The French besieged the castle and forced the surrender of the garrison on 31 July. The Protestant nobles and others, including Knox, were taken prisoner and forced to row in the French galleys. The galley slaves were chained to benches and rowed throughout the day without a change of posture while an officer watched over them with a whip in hand. They sailed to France and navigated up the Seine to Rouen. The nobles, some of whom would have an impact later in Knox's life such as William Kirkcaldy and Henry Balnaves, were sent to various castle-prisons in France. Knox and the other galley slaves continued to Nantes and stayed on the Loire throughout the winter. They were threatened with torture if they did not give proper signs of reverence when mass was performed on the ship. Knox recounted an incident in which one of the prisoners—possibly himself, as Knox tended to narrate personal anecdotes in the third person—was required to show devotion to a picture of the Virgin Mary. The prisoner was told to give it a kiss of veneration. He refused and when the picture was pushed up to his face, the prisoner seized the picture and threw it into the sea, saying, "Let our Lady now save herself: she is light enough: let her learn to swim." After that, according to Knox, the Scottish prisoners were no longer forced to perform such devotions.


title: John Knox

text: In summer 1548, the galleys returned to Scotland to scout for English ships. Knox's health was now at its lowest point due to the severity of his confinement. He was ill with a fever and others on the ship were afraid for his life. Even in this state, Knox recalled, his mind remained sharp and he comforted his fellow prisoners with hopes of release. While the ships were lying offshore between St Andrews and Dundee, the spires of the parish church where he preached appeared in view. James Balfour, a fellow prisoner, asked Knox whether he recognised the landmark. He replied that he knew it well, recognising the steeple of the place where he first preached and he declared that he would not die until he had preached there again.


title: John Knox

text: In February 1549, after spending a total of 19 months in the galley-prison, Knox was released. It is uncertain how he obtained his liberty. Later in the year, Henry II arranged with Edward VI of England the release of all remaining Castilian prisoners.


title: John Knox

text: On his release, Knox took refuge in England. The Reformation in England was a less radical movement than its Continental counterparts, but there was a definite breach with Rome. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, and the regent of King Edward VI, the Duke of Somerset, were decidedly Protestant-minded. However, much work remained to bring reformed ideas to the clergy and to the people. On 7 April 1549, Knox was licensed to work in the Church of England. His first commission was in Berwick-upon-Tweed. He was obliged to use the recently released 1549 "Book of Common Prayer", which maintained the structure of the Sarum Rite while adapting the content to the doctrine of the reformed Church of England. Knox, however, modified its use to accord with the doctrinal emphases of the Continental reformers. In the pulpit, he preached Protestant doctrines with great effect as his congregation grew.


title: John Knox

text: In England, Knox met his wife, Margery Bowes (died ). Her father, Richard Bowes (died 1558), was a descendant of an old Durham family and her mother, Elizabeth Aske, was an heiress of a Yorkshire family, the Askes of Richmondshire. Elizabeth presumably met Knox when he was employed in Berwick. Several letters reveal a close friendship between them. It is not recorded when Knox married Margery Bowes. Knox attempted to obtain the consent of the Bowes family, but her father and her brother Robert Bowes were opposed to the marriage.


title: John Knox

text: Towards the end of 1550, Knox was appointed a preacher of St Nicholas' Church in Newcastle upon Tyne. The following year he was appointed one of the six royal chaplains serving the King. On 16 October 1551, John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, overthrew the Duke of Somerset to become the new regent of the young King. Knox condemned the "coup d'état" in a sermon on All Saints Day. When Dudley visited Newcastle and listened to his preaching in June 1552, he had mixed feelings about the firebrand preacher, but he saw Knox as a potential asset. Knox was asked to come to London to preach before the Court. In his first sermon, he advocated a change for the 1552 "Book of Common Prayer". The liturgy required worshippers to kneel during communion. Knox and the other chaplains considered this to be idolatry. It triggered a debate where Archbishop Cranmer was called upon to defend the practice. The end result was a compromise in which the famous Black Rubric, which declared that no adoration is intended while kneeling, was included in the second edition.


title: John Knox

text: Soon afterwards, Dudley, who saw Knox as a useful political tool, offered him the bishopric of Rochester. Knox refused, and he returned to Newcastle. On 2 February 1553 Cranmer was ordered to appoint Knox as vicar of All Hallows, Bread Street, in London, placing him under the authority of the Bishop of London, Nicholas Ridley. Knox returned to London in order to deliver a sermon before the King and the Court during Lent and he again refused to take the assigned post. Knox was then told to preach in Buckinghamshire and he remained there until Edward's death on 6 July. Edward's successor, Mary Tudor, re-established Roman Catholicism in England and restored the Mass in all the churches. With the country no longer safe for Protestant preachers, Knox left for the Continent in January 1554 on the advice of friends. On the eve of his flight, he wrote:


title: John Knox

text: Sometime I have thought that impossible it had been, so to have removed my affection from the realm of Scotland, that any realm or nation could have been equal dear to me. But God I take to record in my conscience, that the troubles present (and appearing to be) in the realm of England are double more dolorous unto my heart than ever were the troubles of Scotland.


title: John Knox

text: Knox disembarked in Dieppe, France, and continued to Geneva, where John Calvin had established his authority. When Knox arrived Calvin was in a difficult position. He had recently overseen the Company of Pastors, which prosecuted charges of heresy against the scholar Michael Servetus, although Calvin himself was not capable of voting for or against a civil penalty against Servetus. Knox asked Calvin four difficult political questions: whether a minor could rule by divine right, whether a female could rule and transfer sovereignty to her husband, whether people should obey ungodly or idolatrous rulers, and what party godly persons should follow if they resisted an idolatrous ruler. Calvin gave cautious replies and referred him to the Swiss reformer Heinrich Bullinger in Zürich. Bullinger's responses were equally cautious, but Knox had already made up his mind. On 20 July 1554, he published a pamphlet attacking Mary Tudor and the bishops who had brought her to the throne. He also attacked the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, calling him "no less enemy to Christ than was Nero".


title: John Knox

text: In a letter dated 24 September 1554, Knox received an invitation from a congregation of English exiles in Frankfurt to become one of their ministers. He accepted the call with Calvin's blessing. But no sooner had he arrived than he found himself in a conflict. The first set of refugees to arrive in Frankfurt had subscribed to a reformed liturgy and used a modified version of the "Book of Common Prayer". More recently arrived refugees, however, including Edmund Grindal, the future Archbishop of Canterbury, favoured a stricter application of the book. When Knox and a supporting colleague, William Whittingham, wrote to Calvin for advice, they were told to avoid contention. Knox therefore agreed on a temporary order of service based on a compromise between the two sides. This delicate balance was disturbed when a new batch of refugees arrived that included Richard Cox, one of the principal authors of the "Book of Common Prayer". Cox brought Knox's pamphlet attacking the emperor to the attention of the Frankfurt authorities, who advised that Knox leave. His departure from Frankfurt on 26 March 1555 marked his final breach with the Church of England.


title: John Knox

text: After his return to Geneva, Knox was chosen to be the minister at a new place of worship petitioned from Calvin. As such, he exerted an influence on French Protestants, whether they were exiled in Geneva or in France. In the meantime, Elizabeth Bowes wrote to Knox, asking him to return to Margery in Scotland, which he did at the end of August. Despite initial doubts about the state of the Reformation in Scotland, Knox found the country significantly changed since he was carried off in the galley in 1547. When he toured various parts of Scotland preaching the reformed doctrines and liturgy, he was welcomed by many of the nobility including two future regents of Scotland, the Earl of Moray and the Earl of Mar.


title: John Knox

text: Though the Queen Regent, Mary of Guise, made no move against Knox, his activities caused concern among the church authorities. The bishops of Scotland viewed him as a threat to their authority and summoned him to appear in Edinburgh on 15 May 1556. He was accompanied to the trial by so many influential persons that the bishops decided to call the hearing off. Knox was now free to preach openly in Edinburgh. William Keith, the Earl Marischal, was impressed and urged Knox to write to the Queen Regent. Knox's unusually respectful letter urged her to support the Reformation and overthrow the church hierarchy. Queen Mary took the letter as a joke and ignored it.


title: John Knox

text: Shortly after Knox sent the letter to the Queen Regent, he suddenly announced that he felt his duty was to return to Geneva. In the previous year on 1 November 1555, the congregation in Geneva had elected Knox as their minister and he decided to take up the post. He wrote a final letter of advice to his supporters and left Scotland with his wife and mother-in-law. He arrived in Geneva on 13 September 1556.


title: John Knox

text: For the next two years, he lived a happy life in Geneva. He recommended Geneva to his friends in England as the best place of asylum for Protestants. In one letter he wrote:


title: John Knox

text: I neither fear nor eschame to say, is the most perfect school of Christ that ever was in the earth since the days of the apostles. In other places I confess Christ to be truly preached; but manners and religion so sincerely reformed, I have not yet seen in any other place ...