title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The docile flying abilities of the Gazelle are such that it has been reported as being capable of comfortably flying without its main hydraulic system operation at speeds of up to 100 knots. The flight controls are highly responsive; unusually, the Gazelle lacks a throttle or a trimming system. Hydraulic servo boosters are present on all flight control circuits to mitigate control difficulties in the event of equipment failure.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The Gazelle was designed to be easy to maintain, all bearings were life-rated without need for continuous application of lubrication and most fluid reservoirs to be rapidly inspected. The emphasis in the design stage of achieving minimal maintenance requirements contributed towards the helicopter's low running costs; many of the components were designed to have a service life in excess of 700 flying hours, and in some cases 1,200 flight hours, before requiring replacement. Due to the performance of many of the Gazelle's subsystems, features pioneered upon the Gazelle such as the fenestron would appear upon later Aerospatiale designs.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: As the Gazelle continued to serve into the 21st century, several major modernisation and upgrade programs were undertaken, commonly adding new avionics to increase the aircraft's capabilities. Aerotec group offered an overhaul package to existing operators, which comprised upgraded ballistic protection, night vision goggles, new munitions including rockets and machine guns, and 3D navigational displays; as of 2013, Egypt is said to be interested in upgrading their domestically built Gazelles.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: QinetiQ developed a Direct Voice Input (DVI) system for the Gazelle, the DVI system enables voice control over many aspects of the aircraft, lowering the demands placed upon the crew. In September 2011, QinetiQ and Northrop Grumman proposed outfitting former British Gazelles with autonomous flight management systems derived from the Northrop Grumman MQ-8 Fire Scout, converting them into unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV)s to meet a Royal Navy requirement for an unmanned maritime aerial platform.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: During the 1980s, China acquired eight SA 342L combat helicopters; these were the first dedicated attack helicopters to be operated by the People's Liberation Army. The purchase of further aircraft, including licensed production of the aircraft in China, had been under consideration, but this initiative was apparently abandoned following the end of the Cold War. The small fleet was used to develop anti-armour warfare tactics, Gazelles have also been frequently used to simulate hostile forces during military training exercises.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The French Army has deployed the Gazelle overseas in many large-scale operations, often in support of international military interventions; including in Chad (in the 1980s), the former Yugoslavia (1990s), Djibouti (1991–1992), Somalia (1993), Cote d'Ivoire (2002–present) and Afghanistan (2002–2021). In 1990–1991, upwards of 50 French Gazelles were deployed as part of France's contribution to coalition forces during the First Gulf War.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: During the subsequent military action, known as Operation Desert Storm, HOT-carrying Gazelles were employed by several nations' forces, including Kuwait's air force, against Iraqi military forces occupying neighbouring Kuwait. During the coalition's offensive into Kuwait, French Gazelles adopted a tactic of strafing enemy tanks, vehicles, and bunkers in continuous waves at high speed.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Gazelles have often been dispatched to support and protect UN international missions, such as the 1992 intervention in the Bosnian War. In addition to performing land-based operations, French Gazelles have also been frequently deployed from French naval vessels. In April 2008, witnesses reported up to six French Gazelles reportedly firing rockets upon Somali pirates during a major counter-piracy operation. During the 2011 military intervention in Libya, multiple Gazelles were operated from the French Navy's amphibious assault ship Tonnerre; strikes were launched into Libya against pro-Gadhafi military forces.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Military interventions in African nations, particularly former French colonies, have often been supported by Gazelles in both reconnaissance and attack roles; nations involved in previous engagements include Chad, Djibouti, Somalia, and the Cote d'Ivoire. In April 2011, as part of a UN-mandated campaign in Côte d'Ivoire, four Gazelle attack helicopters, accompanied by two Mil Mi-24 gunships, opened fire upon the compound of rebel president Gbagbo to neutralise heavy weaponry, which led to his surrender. In January 2013, Gazelles were used as gunships in the Opération Serval in Mali, performing raids upon insurgent forces fighting government forces in the north of the country.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 2016 the Direction générale de l'armement announced that Gazelle helicopters of the French Army Aviation's "4th Special Forces Helicopter Regiment" (4ème RHFS) could be equipped with the M134 Minigun.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: During the Iran–Iraq War fought throughout most of the 1980s, a significant amount of French-built military equipment was purchased by Iraq, including a fleet of 40 HOT-armed Gazelles. Iraq reportedly received roughly 100 Gazelle helicopters. The Gazelle was commonly used in conjunction with Soviet-built Mil Mi-24 gunships, and were frequently used in counterattacks against Iranian forces. By 2000, following significant equipment losses resulting from the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq reportedly had only 20 Gazelles left in its inventory.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 2003, US intelligence officials alleged that a French firm had continued to sell spare components for the Gazelle and other French-built aircraft to Iraq via a third-party trading company, despite an embargo being in place. Eurocopter, Aerospatiale's successor company, had denied playing any role, stating in 2008 that "no parts have been delivered to Iraq". In April 2009, Iraq, as part of a larger military procurement initiative, bought six Gazelles from France for training purposes.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Syrian Gazelles were used extensively during the 1982 Lebanon War. In the face of a major Israeli ground advance, repetitive harassment attacks were launched by the Gazelles, which were able to slow their advance. According to author Roger Spiller, panic and a sense of vulnerability quickly spread amongst Israeli tank crews following the first of these Gazelle strikes on 8 June 1982; the range of the Gazelle's HOT missiles being a key factor in its effectiveness. The effectiveness of the Syrian helicopter raids was reduced throughout the month of June as Syrian air defenses were progressively eroded and the Israeli Air Force took aerial supremacy over Eastern Lebanon, thus making operations by attack helicopters increasingly vulnerable. However, Gazelle strikes continued to be successfully performed up to the issuing of a ceasefire.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The 1982 war served to highlight the importance and role of attack helicopters in future conflicts due to their performance on both sides of the conflict. Following the end of the war, the Syrian Army would claim that significant damage had been delivered against Israeli forces, such as the destruction of 30 tanks and 50 other vehicles, against the loss of five helicopters. Israel would claim a loss of seven tanks to the Gazelle strikes and the downing of 12 Syrian Gazelles. Author Kenneth Michael Pollack described the role of Syria's Gazelle helicopters as being "psychologically effective against the Israelis but did little actual damage. Although they employed good Western-style 'pop-up' tactics, the Gazelles were not able to manage more than a few armor kills during the war".


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Following the end of the war, Syria increased the size of its attack helicopter fleet from 16 to 50 Gazelles, complemented by a further 50 heavier Mil Mi-24 gunships. Gazelles were also used several times in Syria during its civil war, most recently being seen supporting troops in the Palmyra Offensive using unguided missiles and HOT ATGMs.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: During the 1991 Gulf War, roughly 15 Gazelles were able to retreat into neighbouring Saudi Arabia, along with other elements of Kuwait's armed forces, during the invasion of the nation by Iraq. During the subsequent coalition offensive to dislodge Iraqi forces from Kuwait, several of the escaped Kuwaiti Gazelles launched attack missions into occupied Kuwait to destroy Iraqi tanks and other, military targets.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The Gazelle was used by the Ecuadoran Army during the 1995 Cenepa war between Ecuador and neighboring Peru, performing missions such as close air support and escorting other helicopters. In 2008, a minor diplomatic spat broke out between Colombia and Ecuador following a reportedly accidental incursion into Colombian airspace by an Ecuadoran Gazelle.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 1973, 142 aircraft were on order by the UK, out of a then-intended fleet of 250. No. 660 Squadron AAC, based in Salamanca Barracks, Germany, was the first British Army unit to be equipped with Gazelles, entering operational service on 6 July 1974. The Gazelles, replacements for the Sioux, were assigned the roles of reconnaissance, troop deployment, direction of artillery fire, casualty evacuation and anti-tank operations. In August 1974, 30 were based at CFS Tern Hill for RAF helicopter training.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The Royal Navy's Gazelles entered service in December 1974 with 705 Naval Air Squadron, Culdrose, to provide all-through flying training in preparation for the Westland Lynx's service entry. A total of 23 Gazelles were ordered for Culdrose. Army-owned AH.1s also entered service with 3 Commando Brigade Air Squadron (3 CBAS) of the Royal Marines and later, the Commando Helicopter Force (CHF) of the Fleet Air Arm, where they operated as utility and reconnaissance helicopters in support of the Royal Marines. The 12 Gazelles for 3 CBAS had entered service in 1975, by which time, there were 310 Gazelles on order for the British military.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Gazelles that had replaced the Sioux in RAF Sek Kong towards the end of 1974(?) had been found unsuitable for Hong Kong and, by the end of 1978, had been returned to the UK and they were replaced by the Scout AH1. During its Cold War service period, the Army Gazelles flew over 660,000 hours and had over 1,000 modifications made to the aircraft. From the early 1980s, Army-operated Gazelles were fitted with the Gazelle Observation Aid, a gyro-stabilised sight to match their target finding capability with that of the Lynx. The type also had a limited, special operations aviation role with 8 Flight Army Air Corps


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The type was also frequently used to perform airborne patrols in Northern Ireland. On 17 February 1978, a British Army Gazelle crashed near Jonesborough, County Armagh, after coming under fire from the Provisional IRA during a ground skirmish.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: During the Falklands War, the Gazelle played a valuable role operating from the flight decks of Royal Navy ships. Under a rapidly performed crash programme specifically for the Falklands conflict, Gazelles were fitted with 68mm SNEB rocket pods and various other optional equipment such as armour plating, flotation gear and folding blade mechanisms.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In a high-profile incident of friendly fire on 6 June 1982, an Army Air Corps Gazelle was mistaken for a low-flying Argentine C-130 Hercules and was shot down by HMS Cardiff', a British Type 42 destroyer.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The Gazelle also operated in reconnaissance and liaison roles during the War in Afghanistan. In 2007, it was reported that, while many British helicopters had struggled with the conditions of the Afghan and Iraqi theatres, the Gazelle was the "best performing model" with roughly 80% being available for planned operations.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Various branches of the British military have operated Gazelles in other theatres, such as during the 1991 Gulf War against Iraq and in the 1999 intervention in Kosovo. In 2009, the Army Air Corps was the sole operator of the Gazelle with approximately 40 in service with a planned out of service date in 2012. In October 2009, it was announced that the out of service date had been extended to support domestic commitments including to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) until 2018 at which point the PSNI was to have their own assets.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In July 2016, the Ministry of Defence announced that the Gazelle would remain in service until 2025 taking the Gazelle past its 50th anniversary in UK military service and making it the oldest helicopter in active UK inventory. The Gazelle is operated by 29 (BATUS) Flight AAC in Canada supporting the Suffield training site, 665 Squadron AAC in Northern Ireland with aerial surveillance tasks and at the Army Aviation Centre by 7 (Training) Regiment AAC Conversion Flight and 667 (Development & Trials) Squadron AAC. In 2018 and 2019, the Ministry of Defence awarded contracts to sustain the fleet until 2022 with the option of an extension in 2025. In 2019, the Army Air Corps had a fleet of 32 Gazelles with 19 in service.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: It was announced in January 2022 that the rest of the British Army's Gazelles will be phased out by March 2024 to be replaced by Airbus Helicopters H135.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: On 27 June 1991, during the Ten Day War in Slovenia, a Yugoslav Air Force Gazelle helicopter was shot down by a man-portable 9K32 Strela-2 surface-to-air missile over Ljubljana, the first aircraft to be lost during the breakup of Yugoslavia. The Gazelles would see further action in the subsequent Yugoslav Wars, particularly in Bosnia where Republika Srpska Air Force conducted many operations with only five Gazelles lost, and the Kosovo War; as Yugoslavia dissolved, the various successor states would inherit the SOKO-built Gazelles and continue to operate them, such as the Armed Forces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbian Air Force and Montenegro Air Force.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 1980–81, the Lebanese Air Force received from France ten SA 342K/L and SA 341H Gazelles equipped for anti-tank and utility roles, respectively, to equip its newly raised 8th attack squadron at Beirut Air Base. Initially based at the latter location, in 1983 the squadron was relocated north of the Lebanese capital, with the Gazelles being dispersed in small improvised helipads around Jounieh and Adma for security reasons, where one of the helicopters may have been damaged in a failed takeoff.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 1988, a Lebanese Air Force pilot, the Druze Lieutenant Majed Karameh, defected from Adma airfield and flew a SA 342K attack helicopter to the Druze-controlled Chouf District, where it was apprehended by Druze People's Liberation Army (PLA) upon landing and transported by a PLA MAZ-537G tank transporter to the Saïd el-Khateeb Barracks at Hammana in the Baabda District. This particular helicopter appears to have never been used in combat by the PLA (since they had no aviation component, and therefore lacked the technically-proficient personnel to help fly and maintain the captured airframe), which ended up being simply placed on storage at Hammana for the remainder of the Civil War.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: Employed extensively in the gunship role by providing close air support to General Michel Aoun's troops during the final phase of the Lebanese Civil War, combat losses and maintenance problems reduced the Gazelle fleet to just four operational helicopters by 1990, with three of the machines reportedly being apprehended by the Lebanese Forces militia who illegally sold them to Serbia in 1991.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: After the War, the Lebanese Air Force Command made consistent efforts to rebuild its attack helicopter squadron with the help of the United Arab Emirates and nine SA 342L Gazelles formerly in service with the United Arab Emirates Air Force were delivered in 2007. Due to budgetary constraints, the majority of the Gazelles operated by the Lebanese Air Force have often been kept in storage outside of times of conflict.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: The Gazelles saw combat against the Al Qaeda-inspired Fatah al-Islam militants during the 2007 Lebanon conflict. Rocket-armed Gazelles were used to strike insurgent bunkers during the brief conflict. In 2010, a French government official stated that France had offered to provide up to 100 HOT missiles to Lebanon for the Gazelle helicopters. According to reports, France may also provide additional Gazelles to Lebanon.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In January 1981, France and Morocco entered into a $4 billion military procurement deal in which, amongst other vehicles and equipment, 24 Gazelle helicopters were to be delivered to Morocco. The Royal Moroccan Air Force operated these Gazelles, which were equipped with a mix of anti-tank missiles and other ground attack munitions, and made frequent use of the aircraft during battles with Polisario insurgents in the western Sahara region. The reconnaissance capabilities of the Gazelle were instrumental in finding and launching attacks upon insurgent camps due to their mobility.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 1990, following appeals from Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana for French support in interethnic conflict against the Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), nine armed Gazelles were exported to Rwanda in 1992. The Gazelles would see considerable use in the conflict that became known as the Rwandan Civil War, capable of strafing enemy positions as well as performing reconnaissance patrols of Northern Rwanda; in October 1992, a single Gazelle destroyed a column of ten RPF units. According to author Andrew Wallis, the Gazelle gunships helped to stop significant RPF advances and led to a major change in RPF tactics towards guerrilla warfare. In 1994, French forces dispatched as a part of Opération Turquoise, a United Nations-mandated intervention in the conflict, also operated a number of Gazelles in the theatre.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: As part of a major international initiative formalised in 1975 to build up Arab military industries, Egypt commenced widescale efforts to replace arms imports with domestic production to provide military equipment to the rest of the Middle East, other Arab partner nations included Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar. Both France and Britain would form large agreements with Egypt; in March 1978, the Arab British Helicopter Company (ABHCO) was formally established in a $595 million deal with Westland Helicopters, initially for the purpose of domestically assembly of British Westland Lynx helicopters. An initial order for 42 Gazelles was placed in mid-1975. In the 1980s, ABHCO performed the assembly of a significant number of Gazelles; the British Arab Engine Company also produced engines for Egyptian-build Gazelles.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: In 2021, three Gazelle helicopters played a significant role in the Battle of Palma, providing air support at the behest of the Mozambique security forces battling the insurgents and evacuating civilians and contractors from the besieged town.


title: Aérospatiale Gazelle

text: There are a large number of Gazelles preserved. In the UK, the following Gazelles are in preservation, either in museums or as "gate guards" at various facilities.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: The Carnival of the Animals (Le Carnaval des animaux) is a humorous musical suite of fourteen movements, including "The Swan", by the French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. The work, about 25 minutes in duration, was written for private performance by two pianos and chamber ensemble; Saint-Saëns prohibited public performance of the work during his lifetime, feeling that its frivolity would damage his standing as a serious composer. The suite was published in 1922, the year after his death. A public performance in the same year was greeted with enthusiasm, and the work has remained among his most popular. In addition to the original version for chamber ensemble, the suite is frequently performed with a full orchestral complement of strings.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Following a disastrous concert tour of Germany in 1885–86, Saint-Saëns withdrew to a small Austrian village, where he composed "The Carnival of the Animals" in February 1886. From the beginning he regarded the work as a piece of fun. On 9 February 1886 he wrote to his publishers Durand in Paris that he was composing a work for the coming Shrove Tuesday, and confessing that he knew he should be working on his Third Symphony, but that this work was "such fun" (). He had apparently intended to write the work for his students at the École Niedermeyer de Paris, but it was first performed at a private concert given by the cellist Charles Lebouc on 3 March 1886:


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: A few days later, a second performance was given at Émile Lemoine's chamber music society La Trompette, followed by another at the home of Pauline Viardot with an audience including Franz Liszt, a friend of the composer, who had expressed a wish to hear the work. There were other performances, typically for the French mid-Lent festival of . All those performances were semi-private, except for one at the Société des instruments à vent in April 1892, and "often took place with the musicians wearing masks of the heads of the various animals they represented". Saint-Saëns was adamant that the work would not be published in his lifetime, seeing it as detracting from his "serious" composer image. He relented only for the famous cello solo "The Swan", which forms the penultimate movement of the work, and which was published in 1887 in an arrangement by the composer for cello and solo piano (the original uses two pianos).


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Saint-Saëns specified in his will that the work should be published posthumously. Following his death in December 1921 it was published by Durand in Paris in April 1922; the first public performance was given on 25 February 1922 by the Concerts Colonne, conducted by Gabriel Pierné. It was rapturously received. "Le Figaro" reported:


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: "The Carnival of the Animals" has since become one of Saint-Saëns's best-known works, played in the original version for eleven instruments, or more often with the full string section of an orchestra. Frequently a glockenspiel substitutes for the rare glass harmonica.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: The suite is scored for two pianos, two violins, viola, cello, double bass, flute (and piccolo), clarinet (C and B), glass harmonica, and xylophone. There are fourteen movements, each representing a different animal or animals:


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings and two pianos: the introduction begins with the pianos playing a bold tremolo, under which the strings enter with a stately theme. The pianos play a pair of glissandos going in opposite directions to conclude the first part of the movement. The pianos then introduce a march theme that they carry through most of the rest of the introduction. The strings provide the melody, with the pianos occasionally taking low chromatic scales in octaves which suggest the roar of a lion, or high "ostinatos". The two groups of instruments switch places, with the pianos playing a higher, softer version of the melody. The movement ends with a fortissimo note from all the instruments used in this movement.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings without cello and double bass, two pianos, with clarinet: this movement is centered around a pecking theme played in the pianos and strings, which is quite reminiscent of chickens pecking at grain. The clarinet plays a small solo above the strings. The piano plays a very fast theme based on the crowing of a rooster's Cock-a-Doodle-Doo.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Two pianos: the animals depicted here are quite obviously running, an image induced by the constant, feverishly fast up-and-down motion of both pianos playing figures in octaves. These are dziggetai, donkeys that come from Tibet and are known for their great speed.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings and piano: a satirical movement which opens with a piano playing a pulsing triplet figure in the higher register. The strings play a slow rendition of the famous "Galop infernal" (commonly called the Can-can) from Offenbach's comic opera "Orphée aux enfers" (Orpheus in the Underworld).


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Double bass and piano: this section is marked Allegro pomposo, the great caricature for an elephant. The piano plays a waltz-like triplet figure while the bass hums the melody beneath it. Like "Tortues," this is also a musical joke—the thematic material is taken from the Scherzo from Mendelssohn's incidental music to "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and Berlioz's "Dance of the Sylphs" from "The Damnation of Faust". The two themes were both originally written for high, lighter-toned instruments (flute and various other woodwinds, and violin, accordingly); the joke is that Saint-Saëns moves this to the lowest and heaviest-sounding instrument in the orchestra, the double bass.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Two pianos: the main figure here is a pattern of "hopping" chords (made up of triads in various positions) preceded by grace notes in the right hand. When the chords ascend, they quickly get faster and louder, and when the chords descend, they quickly get slower and softer.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Violins, viola, cello (string quartet), two pianos, flute, and glass harmonica. The melody is played by the flute, backed by the strings, and glass harmonica on top of tumultuous, glissando-like runs and arpeggios in pianos. The first piano plays a descending ten-on-one, and eight-on-one ostinato, in the style of the second of Chopin's études, while the second plays a six-on-one. These figures, plus the occasional glissando from the glass harmonica towards the end—often played on celesta or glockenspiel—are evocative of a peaceful, dimly lit aquarium.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Two violins: this is the shortest of all the movements. The violins alternate playing high, loud notes and low, buzzing ones (in the manner of a donkey's braying "hee-haw").


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Music critics have speculated that the movement is meant to compare music critics to braying donkeys.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Two pianos and clarinet: the pianos play large, soft chords while the clarinet plays a single two-note ostinato; a C and an A, mimicking the call of a cuckoo bird. Saint-Saëns states in the original score that the clarinetist should be offstage.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings, pianos and flute: the high strings take on a background role, providing a buzz in the background that is reminiscent of the background noise of a jungle. The cellos and basses play a pickup cadence to lead into most of the measures. The flute takes the part of the bird, with a trilling tune that spans much of its range. The pianos provide occasional pings and trills of other birds in the background. The movement ends very quietly after a long ascending chromatic scale from the flute.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings and two pianos: this humorous movement (satirizing pianists as animals) is a glimpse of what few audiences ever get to see: the pianists practicing their finger exercises and scales. The scales of C, D, D and E are covered. Each one starts with a trill on the first and second note, then proceeds in scales with a few changes in the rhythm. Transitions between keys are accomplished with a blasting chord from all the instruments between scales. In some performances, the later, more difficult, scales are deliberately played increasingly out of time. The original edition has a note by the editors instructing the players to imitate beginners and their awkwardness. After the four scales, the key changes back to C, where the pianos play a moderate speed trill-like pattern in thirds, in the style of Charles-Louis Hanon or Carl Czerny, while the strings play a small part underneath. This movement is unusual in that the last three blasted chords do not resolve the piece, but rather lead into the next movement.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Strings, two pianos, clarinet, and xylophone: here, Saint-Saëns mimics his own composition, the "Danse macabre", which makes heavy use of the xylophone to evoke the image of skeletons dancing, the bones clacking together to the beat. The musical themes from "Danse macabre" are also quoted; the xylophone and the violin play much of the melody, alternating with the piano and clarinet. Allusions to ""Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman"" (better known in the English-speaking world as "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star"), the French nursery rhymes "Au clair de la lune", and "J'ai du bon tabac" (the second piano plays the same melody upside down [inversion]), the popular anthem "Partant pour la Syrie", as well as the aria "Una voce poco fa" from Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" can also be heard. The musical joke in this movement, according to Leonard Bernstein's narration on his recording of the work with the New York Philharmonic, is that the musical pieces quoted are the fossils of Saint-Saëns's time.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Two pianos and cello: a slowly moving cello melody (which evokes the swan elegantly gliding over the water) is played over rippling sixteenths in one piano and rolled chords in the other.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: A staple of the cello repertoire, this is one of the best-known movements of the suite, usually in the version for cello with solo piano which was the only publication from this suite in Saint-Saëns's lifetime.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: A short ballet solo, "The Dying Swan", was choreographed in 1905 by Mikhail Fokine to this movement and performed by Anna Pavlova. Pavlova gave some 4,000 performances of the dance and "swept the world."


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Full ensemble: the finale opens on the same trills in the pianos as in the introduction, but soon the wind instruments, the glass harmonica and the xylophone join in. The strings build the tension with a few low notes, leading to glissandi by the piano before the lively main melody is introduced. The Finale is somewhat reminiscent of an American carnival of the 19th century, with one piano always maintaining a bouncy eighth-note rhythm. Although the melody is relatively simple, the supporting harmonies are ornamented in the style that is typical of Saint-Saëns' compositions for piano -- dazzling scales, glissandi and trills. Many of the previous movements are quoted here from the introduction, the lion, the donkeys, hens, and kangaroos. The work ends with a series of six "Hee Haws" from the donkeys, as if to say that the donkey has the last laugh, before the final strong group of C major chords.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: As the title suggests, the work is programmatical and zoological. It progresses from the first movement, ", through portraits of elephants and donkeys ("Personages with Long Ears") to a finale reprising many of the earlier motifs.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: In 1949 Ogden Nash wrote a set of humorous verses to accompany each movement for a Columbia Masterworks recording of "Carnival of the Animals" conducted by Andre Kostelanetz. They were recited by Noël Coward; Kostelanetz and Coward performed the suite with Nash's verses with the New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall, New York, in 1956.


title: The Carnival of the Animals

text: Nash's verses, with their topical references (e.g. to President Truman's piano playing) became dated, and later writers have written new words to accompany the suite, including Johnny Morris, Jeremy Nicholas, Jack Prelutsky, John Lithgow, and Michael Morpurgo, whose version was recorded in 2020, and given at the Proms in 2021 by Morpurgo and an ensemble comprising Sheku Kanneh-Mason, members of his family and other musicians.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: "Finale" is the last episode of the American comedy television series "The Office". It serves as the 24th and 25th episodes of the ninth season, and the 200th and 201st episodes of the series overall. The episode was written by series developer and executive producer Greg Daniels and directed by Ken Kwapis, who directed the series' pilot episode. It originally aired on NBC on May 16, 2013, preceded by an hour-long series retrospective.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The series—presented as if it were a real documentary—depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania, branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. In the episode, which takes place a year after the previous episode "A.A.R.M.", present and past employees of Dunder Mifflin gather for the wedding of Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) and Angela Martin (Angela Kinsey), during which Michael Scott (Steve Carell) returns to serve as Dwight's best man. In addition, Pam Halpert (Jenna Fischer) and Jim Halpert (John Krasinski) finally decide to pursue Jim's dream of working in sports marketing. Finally, everyone comes together for a final round of interviews and goodbyes.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The initial idea for the finale, involving the Q&A, was thought of by Daniels during production of the third season. The episode features the return of many recurring characters, as well as Carell, whose return was kept secret for many months and went uncredited. B. J. Novak and Mindy Kaling, who departed the series after "New Guys", are again credited as stars for reprising their roles as Ryan Howard and Kelly Kapoor. Many members of the show's crew—such as episode writer Daniels—made cameos in the episode as various background characters, and then-"Saturday Night Live" stars Bill Hader and Seth Meyers appear as themselves.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The episode was viewed by an estimated 5.69 million viewers and received 3.0 rating among adults between the ages of 18 and 49, making it the highest-rated episode of the series since the eighth season installment, "Pool Party". "Finale" received critical acclaim, with many critics complimenting the writers for wrapping up the storylines for most of the characters. Critics also praised Carell's cameo, with many arguing that it was perfectly executed. This episode received three Primetime Emmy Award nominations for the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards, and won for Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Comedy Series.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: One year since the documentary has aired, the crew has returned to provide more footage for the DVD bonus features. After being hired as regional manager for Scranton, Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) and Angela Martin (Angela Kinsey) are getting married. Andy Bernard (Ed Helms), after being humiliated with his talent show audition tape going viral on the internet, has found a job at his alma mater Cornell University in the Admissions Office. Darryl Philbin (Craig Robinson) has helped expand Athlead, now named Athleap, opening a branch in Austin, Texas. Stanley Hudson (Leslie David Baker) is enjoying retirement in Florida and Phyllis Vance (Phyllis Smith) tries to get Stanley's replacement Malcolm (Malcolm Barrett) fat on chocolates to make him look like Stanley. After being fired by Dwight, Kevin Malone (Brian Baumgartner) bought a bar and Toby Flenderson (Paul Lieberstein) started a career as an author in New York City. Nellie Bertram (Catherine Tate) has moved to Poland. Creed Bratton (Creed Bratton) had faked his death but was then revealed to be a wanted fugitive using a fake identity, so Dwight replaced him with former employee Devon White (Devon Abner). Oscar Martinez (Oscar Nunez) is preparing to run for a State Senate seat and is now Phillip's godfather. Andy, Darryl, Stanley, Toby, and Nellie return to Scranton for the wedding as well as a panel for the documentary.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Jim Halpert (John Krasinski) has been appointed best man at the wedding and plans a series of "good surprises" ("Guten Pranken") for Dwight during his bachelor party, which consists of most of the current and former male employees. At the bachelor party, the group has Dwight fire a bazooka and receive a lap dance from Elizabeth the Stripper (Jackie Debatin), though Dwight thinks she is their waitress and remains oblivious, to Jim's delight. At the bachelorette party, with the current and former female employees plus Angela's sister Rachael (Rachael Harris), the group is horrified to see that the stripper hired for entertainment is Meredith Palmer's (Kate Flannery) son Jake (Spencer Daniels); despite this, Meredith helps him with his dance, disgusting everyone else. Angela is kidnapped by Dwight's cousin Mose (Michael Schur), as part of Schrute tradition where he takes her to a bar where Dwight must buy everyone drinks. Upon this, the men visit the bar that Kevin owns, where Dwight, at Jim's insistence to bury the hatchet, tells Kevin that his firing was not personal but based solely on his poor job performance, which cheers him up. Mose then leads Dwight and Jim out to his car where Angela is stuck in the trunk and finally lets her out.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The following day, a panel is held for the office so that audience members can ask them questions. Dunder Mifflin CEO David Wallace (Andy Buckley) states his distaste for the documentary. Pam Halpert (Jenna Fischer) is pressed with questions about why she did not allow Jim to follow his dream after he has paid her so many romantic gestures. Jim attempts to disperse the resulting tension. Erin Hannon (Ellie Kemper) finally meets her birth parents (Ed Begley Jr. and Joan Cusack), who had put her up for adoption.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: At the wedding, Kelly Kapoor (Mindy Kaling) arrives with her fiancé Ravi (Sendhil Ramamurthy), where Ryan Howard (B. J. Novak) surprises them with a baby, his son, Drake, that his former girlfriend had abandoned with him. Jim tells Dwight that under Schrute tradition, he is not allowed to be best man as he is younger than him. Jim surprises him with the arrival of Michael Scott (Steve Carell); when Dwight expresses his surprise at Michael coming to the event, Michael replies with an emotional "that's what she said" joke. The wedding proceeds in Schrute tradition with Michael as Dwight's new best man. At the reception, Michael shows Pam pictures of his kids with Holly Flax, and Pam notes that he is paying for two phones just to hold all the images. Stanley gifts Phyllis a wood carving he made in her image, moving her to tears, the two admitting they have missed each other. Ryan deliberately gives Drake an allergic reaction so that Ravi, a pediatrician, can attend and Ryan can steal Kelly away. Kevin tells Ravi that Ryan wanted him to keep Drake so that Ryan can have Kelly and the two can start a new life together. Ravi then gives Kevin the baby to give to Child Services before leaving, but Nellie, who has still been wanting a child, decides to raise Drake instead.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: When Jim and Pam briefly return home, Jim is surprised to find Carol Stills (Nancy Carell) showing their house to another couple. Pam comes clean and admits she has been showing the house for two months. She wants to repay Jim for all his romantic gestures and says she wants him to go to Athleap in Austin, at which point the couple seeing the house make an offer. Jim and Pam go to an after party at the warehouse where they inform an elated Darryl of their plans, with Jim being able to rejoin the company with no change. Pam unveils a new painted mural featuring the history of their branch. A final picture is taken with the employees and the camera crew before the employees go back up to the office for a final toast. Jim and Pam tell Dwight they are quitting, but Dwight fires them instead so he can give them hefty severance packages, as a last gesture of friendship. The employees find Creed, who has been living in Ryan's old closet since faking his death, in the office. Creed sings a song on the guitar for the office before being arrested.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The employees give one last round of interviews before leaving: Kevin states that if you film someone long enough, they will do something stupid. Dwight talks about how well he has gotten along with his subordinates. Andy wishes for a way to "know you're in the good old days before you've actually left them." Oscar notes that you can make something special out of the ordinary. Erin is astounded that the documentary crew perfectly documented their lives, and asks how cameras work. Darryl reflects that for all the time he spent wanting to leave work, it feels so hard to leave right now. Creed talks about how humans have the odd ability to make a place their home, and is then shown being led away by the police. Meredith is glad to have shared her story. Phyllis is glad she can remember everything everyone did. Jim tearfully talks about seeing his life story of finding love and family, and how despite the often boring and frustrating work, he owes everything he has to this job. Pam ends the series by stating that "there’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn’t that kind of the point?" Finally, Pam takes her watercolor of the office building that Michael bought from her in the third-season episode "Business School", followed by stock footage of Michael Scott hanging the watercolor next to the regional manager's office, which then transitions into the closing shot of the actual Dunder Mifflin Paper Company Scranton Branch Building.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: "Finale" was written by series developer and showrunner Greg Daniels, making it his second writing credit for the year, after the season debut "New Guys", and his 12th writing credit overall. It was directed by Ken Kwapis, who had originally directed the series' pilot episode. Daniels joked that Kwapis was "the country vet who birthed this puppy" and had come "back to put it down". Prior to directing "Finale", he also directed the fifth season episode "Company Picnic". The initial idea for the finale was thought of by Daniels during production of the third season, described as "a reunion show", in the fashion of the post-competition cast rehashes familiar from reality shows like "Survivor"".


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Daniels, at one point, approached Jeff Probst, the host of "Survivor", to appear in the finale as a moderator for the fictional reunion, although he declined. The initial table read for the episode took place on March 4, 2013. Filming commenced on March 6. According to Jenna Fischer, the episode took nine days to film, with the cast devoting 12 hours a day to the episode. The finale was described as "ambitious", featuring multiple location shoots, including one in an AT&T Office Building, which stood in for the Scranton Cultural Center. Filming for the episode and series as a whole came to an end on March 16, 2013. Wilson later tweeted a picture of the empty set after all filming had been finished.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Originally, the episode was supposed to be the 23rd and 24th episodes of the season, which would have meant that the series aired exactly 200 episodes. However, the series' penultimate episode was elongated into 2 separate episodes, resulting in "Finale" being the 24th and 25th episodes of the season. This meant that the last part of "Finale" is the series' 201st episode. Once filming finished Daniels, in an interview with TVLine, expressed his hope to expand the episode, stating, "I was very excited with the footage we got ... It's very big. I'm going to beg NBC to super-size it or extend it." Daniels later commented that when the editors cut together the first act, it was 23 minutes long; this is much longer than a normal first act for an hour long episode of television. In response, OfficeTally—the largest fan site for the series—started an online petition to supersize the finale, similar to the petition to expand the second-season finale, "Casino Night". By May 2, the petition had received over 20,000 signatures. On May 7, it was announced that NBC had extended the episode by 15 minutes, meaning that the episode would air in a 75-minute time slot. The episode is approximately 52 minutes in length.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The series finale guest stars Rachael Harris, Dakota Johnson, Joan Cusack, Ed Begley Jr., and Malcolm Barrett. The episode features the return of several of the series' actors and actresses, including former series writers and stars B. J. Novak and Mindy Kaling, as well as Andy Buckley, Robert R. Shafer, Michael Schur, and Matt Jones. Other minor recurring characters also make appearances, such as Nancy Carell as Carol Stills (who played the recurring role as Michael's real-estate agent and short-time girlfriend), Sendhil Ramamurthy as Ravi (who first appeared in the eighth-season episode "Angry Andy"), Eric Wareheim as Gabor (who first appeared in the earlier ninth-season episode "Junior Salesman"), James Urbaniak as Rolf (who first appeared in the fifth-season episode "Company Picnic"), Jackie Debatin as Elizabeth (who first appeared in the third-season episode "Ben Franklin"), Devon Abner as Devon (who was a former Dunder Mifflin employee fired in second-season episode "Halloween"), and Spencer Daniels as Jake Palmer (who first played Meredith's son in the second-season episode "Take Your Daughter to Work Day"). The episode also features Bill Hader and Seth Meyers playing themselves.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Many members of the show's crew made cameos in the episode. The documentary crewman's voice that speaks to Dwight was played by camera operator Matt Sohn. The "frat boy" who mocks Andy at the restaurant was Greg Daniels' former assistant, Jonah Platt. Jay Falk, a script editor for the series, and his wife stood in for the couple buying Jim and Pam's house. Jennifer Celotta, a series writer and director, makes an appearance at Dwight's wedding. The episode's call sheet listed her character as "Jen Celotta Schrute". Producer and writer Graham Wagner also makes a cameo in both Mose's group, as well as at the wedding. Many of the individuals who asked questions were writers on the show: Brent Forrester asked about seeing their lives on TV, Amelie Gillette asked the question regarding Jim giving up Athlead, Steve Burgess asked if the camera changed the characters' behavior, Steve Hely asked if life has no meaning, Allison Silverman made the statement that Jim is attractive, and Dan Sterling asked what was in the teapot. Daniels' wife, Susanne Daniels, was the Q&A moderator. Daniels himself appeared during the documentary after-party along with executive producer Howard Klein, editors David Rogers and Claire Scanlon, script supervisor Veda Semarne, first assistant director Rusty Mahmood, prop master Phil Shea, and casting director Allison Jones. The remaining extras in the scene were members of the crew of "The Office".


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Jennie Tan, the founder of the largest "The Office" fansite OfficeTally appears in the episode as a fictional version of herself asking the members of the office questions. She initially emailed Daniels, asking if she could appear in the background in one of the scenes. He, however, hired her as a day actor and wrote her seven lines. During the filming, Daniels re-wrote part of Tan's line to make it more "pointed". Tan called the experience "surreal", because she was "playing [herself] but talking to Jim and Pam", rather than Krasinski and Fischer.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Early during production for the season, Kinsey and Wilson noted in an interview that the cast and crew were hoping for the return of former lead actor Carell. In mid-December, Krasinski later revealed that he was optimistic about a return; in an interview with E! Online Krasinski said that the producers were supposedly "still trying to figure out [Carell's] schedule" and that the finale "just wouldn't be the same without him". However, NBC chairman Robert Greenblatt later admitted during an interview that while he was "hopeful", he did not think Carell would return; he noted that Carell was satisfied with his character's exit and did not want to tarnish it. On January 16, Daniels revealed that Carell would not appear in the finale in any capacity, a decision that Carell later reiterated. Several months later, however, TVLine reported that the producers for "The Office" mounted "an 11th hour effort" to get Carell to make a cameo in the show's final episode. According to the article, "while no one is confirming that the final diplomatic push proved successful, no one is denying it either." Carell's personal representative confirmed that Carell was on the set for the final episode, but that he did not film any scenes. However, an anonymous source close to the show cryptically said "don't rule anything out". TVLine later reported on May 6, that Carell would appear in a cameo, although NBC declined to comment and Carell's representatives continued to deny the reports. A month after the episode aired, Carell explained in an interview with TVLine that he "lied for months to the press, to almost everyone, really". He noted that he "felt terribly for the cast and for [executive producer] Greg Daniels, because they all lied, too." Krasinski, on the other hand, explained that "It was so thrilling. We all just flat-out lied... It was just one of those things that we all vowed and had to protect". Even at the initial table read for the script, Carell's appearance was not revealed. In fact, his first line was not included in the read at all, and his second was scripted to be delivered by Creed Bratton.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The Season Nine DVD contains a number of deleted scenes from this episode. Notable cut scenes include: more scenes from the Q&A panel; Pete discussing what he learned working at Dunder Mifflin; toasts at Dwight and Angela's wedding from Angela's sister, Phyllis, and Andy; more scenes with Erin and her biological parents in which they reconnect; further shots of the office members reminiscing about shared memories; and the office taking one of the potted plants outside and planting it in actual soil. Erin's parents explain that they, like Erin, are puppeteers, and when they worked on the movie "The Dark Crystal", it gave them such gloomy thoughts they didn't think they could handle bringing up a baby. The episode originally was scripted to begin with a different cold open; it would have entailed a prank on Dwight by Jim, in which Dwight is led to believe that he is actually living in the Matrix, a computer-simulation from the eponymous 1999 film of the same name. The scene was cut from the episode and not included with the other deleted scenes, but it was shared via Facebook by Peacock TV on January 1, 2021. A table read of it—along with the rest of the episode—was included as a bonus feature on the ninth season DVD.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The episode makes a reference to Creed being a member of the rock band The Grass Roots. In fact, Creed Bratton, who portrays a fictionalized version of himself on the show, did play with the band from 1967 to 1969. The song he performs near the end is titled "All the Faces", which he wrote himself. Andy mentions that both the "Double Rainbow Guy" and the "Star Wars Kid" reached out to help him after his viral video mishap. Both Hader and Meyers appear in a fictional "Saturday Night Live" Weekend Update sketch involving Andy's viral fame. After Pam compares her and Jim's relationship to a great book that never ends, Tan's character asks if it is comparable to the "Harry Potter" series. Dwight claims that Google is actually a front for either the United States government or "the government of other countries".


title: Finale (The Office)

text: The episode also features several callback references to previous episodes. Oscar saying "Whazzup!" serves as a reference to a scene from "Pilot" between Michael, Dwight, and Jim. Jim's description in his final talking head of his job is a direct quote from his first talking head in "Pilot". Dwight hires Devon back after Creed quits, a reference to "Halloween", when Creed convinced Michael to fire Devon. Pam sits at reception one final time and answers the phone, saying "Dunder Mifflin, this is Pam." This is a reference to Pam's former role as office receptionist and a common phrase that she said during the early seasons. Pam's painting of the office building, introduced in "Business School", plays a prominent role in the final scene.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: "Finale" originally aired on May 16, 2013, on NBC in a 75-minute timeslot, preceded by a one-hour retrospective. The retrospective was viewed by 4.37 million viewers and received a 2.1/7% rating among adults between the ages of 18 and 49. The finale itself was viewed by 5.69 million viewers and received a 3.0 rating/8% share among adults between the ages of 18 and 49. This means that it was seen by 3.0 percent of all 18- to 49-year-olds, and 8 percent of all 18- to 49-year-olds watching television at the time of the broadcast. This marked a significant increase, of over one million viewers, in the ratings from the previous episode, "A.A.R.M.". It also ranks as the highest-rated episode of the season, as well as the highest-rated episode for the series since the eighth season entry, "Pool Party", which was viewed by 6.02 million viewers and received a 3.0/7% share. The episode ranked second in its timeslot, being beaten by the ABC medical drama series, "Grey's Anatomy". NBC increased their usual ad price by 200 percent for "Finale", asking for $400,000 per commercial. This was largely due to the anticipated increase in viewership that the finale would bring. Via DVR viewing, the episode was watched by an additional 2.38 million viewers with an added 18- to 49-year rating of 1.4, bringing the total to 8.07 million viewers and an 18- to 49-year rating of 4.4.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: "Finale" was met with acclaim from television critics. Alan Sepinwall of HitFix gave the episode a highly positive review and called it "a tremendously satisfying conclusion to a show that could make us gasp with laughter, but that could also make us cry or smile". Sepinwall noted that, despite the inconsistency in the last few seasons, "the world was rich enough to fuel a lovely 75-minute trip through the past, present and future of "The Office". Ultimately, he noted that the "biggest emotional moments" belonged to Jim and Pam, and their final talking heads. Roth Cornet of IGN awarded the episode a 9 out of 10, denoting an "amazing" episode. She was highly pleased with the final fifteen minutes, noting that "in those final moments, this series hit every note we could have wanted, without overplaying any of them." She concluded that it "was a strong hour of television [and] the finale shone and delivered on all of its promise." Hillary Busis of "Entertainment Weekly" praised the entry, writing that "for anyone who's stuck with "The Office" through thick and thin ... last night's 75-minute-long finale was pretty much perfect." She wrote that "the finale had no shortage of sob-inducing moments", and applauded all of the characters' various happy endings.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Nick Campbell of TV.com wrote that the episode was "just right" for the series, and that it highlighted the fact that "the ending was more about the fact that you took a journey with these characters." He wrote that all of the character's subplots had emotion, even if they appeared slightly contrived. Ultimately he concluded that "it felt okay to say goodbye because it was the right atmosphere." James Poniewozik of "Time" wrote that the finale was "touching, sweet, funny, messy, a little manipulative. And in the end, it worked." He found that "The stuff that was like latter-seasons "Office"", such as Andy and Dwight's antics, were "all right" but that "the stuff that recalled the sweep of the whole series was wonderful." Poniewozik was slightly critical of Pam and Jim's story, noting that in the grand scheme of the show it was successful, but that it makes slightly less sense when one examines it closely; however, he felt that even "if the details don't add up, the emotions do". He concluded that the episode "worked mostly as an epilogue" and allowed the cast of the series to have their final moments.


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Brian Lowry of "Variety" wrote that the finale "ignored" the last few seasons' missteps and was "awash in warmth and inside gags". He concluded that the show "deserved to finish on top", and that while some of the scenes, such as Dwight's wedding, seemed "a little bit trite", the resulting product was successful. Michael Tedder of "Vulture" awarded the episode five stars out of five and wrote that the episode was able to provide solid conclusions for all of the characters. Erik Adams of "The A.V. Club" awarded the episode an "A−" and wrote that "the quality of this series finale is found in the way it functions right now, in the afterglow of a TV show to which many devoted more than 100 hours of their lives. Some aspects of the episode fall flat, but when it hits, it hits." Ultimately, he found that Finale' is not a great piece of television" but that it was the finale that ""The Office" needed" because it was "the right point to jump off ... the circular track", due to the series idea of thematic reoccurrence. Tom Gliatto of "People" magazine, however, gave the episode a negative review, and wrote that "this episode was poorly conceived and clumsily structured. It really wasn't worthy of all the years of affectionate humor that had gone before it."


title: Finale (The Office)

text: Steve Carell's cameo received glowing reviews from critics. Campbell noted that he was "glad [Carell's] return was still uncertain [before the episode aired] because the reveal was made that much sweeter." Sepinwall noted that Carell's return managed to not "overshadow the stories of the people who remained after he left, but which made sense for the characters, and the end of the series." Adams noted that "Carell doesn't get a lot to say—he's already had his chance to say goodbye—but that just makes each of his lines count more". Cornet felt that the cameo's "brevity" was "the perfect amount of Michael for this particular episode". Poniewozik described it as "a way that as best as possible walked the line between overplaying and underplaying Steve Carell's cameo." Lowry called it a "perfectly orchestrated cameo". Basis wrote that the appearance was "pretty great" and that "the notion of Michael finally getting the family he's always wanted was enough to melt the heart of even the nit-pickiest fan."


title: Finale (The Office)

text: This episode received three Primetime Emmy Award nominations for the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards. Greg Daniels was nominated for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series and Ben Patrick, John W. Cook, and Rob Carr were nominated for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (Half-Hour) and Animation. David Rogers and Claire Scanlon won for Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Comedy Series, marking the fifth win for "The Office" at the Emmys overall and the series' first win since 2009. Rogers and Scanlon also won an ACE Eddie award for Best Edited Half-Hour Series for Television.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Perkin Warbeck ( 1474 – 23 November 1499) was a pretender to the English throne claiming to be Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, who was the second son of Edward IV and one of the so-called "Princes in the Tower". Richard, were he alive, would have been the rightful claimant to the throne, assuming that his elder brother Edward V was dead and that he was legitimate—a point that had been previously contested by his uncle, King Richard III.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Due to the uncertainty as to whether Richard had died (either of some natural cause or having been murdered in the Tower of London) or whether he had somehow survived, Warbeck's claim gained some support. Followers may have truly believed Warbeck was Richard or may have supported him simply because of their desire to overthrow the reigning king, Henry VII, and reclaim the throne. Given the lack of knowledge regarding Richard's fate, and having received support outside England, Warbeck emerged as a significant threat to the newly established Tudor dynasty; Henry declared Warbeck an impostor.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck made several landings in England backed by small armies but met strong resistance from the King's men and surrendered in Hampshire in 1497. After his capture, he retracted his claim, writing a confession in which he said he was a Fleming born in Tournai around 1474. He was executed on 23 November 1499. Dealing with Warbeck cost Henry VII over £13,000 (), putting a strain on Henry's weak state finances.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Perkin Warbeck's personal history is fraught with many unreliable and varying statements. Warbeck said that he was Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, the younger son of King Edward IV, who had disappeared mysteriously along with his brother Edward V after Richard, Duke of Gloucester usurped the throne as King Richard III following the elder Edward's death in 1483. After Warbeck was captured and interrogated in 1497 under the eye of King Henry VII, another version of his life was published, based on his confession. This confession is considered by many historians to be possibly only partially true as it was procured under duress. According to the confession, Warbeck was born to a woman called Katherine de Faro, wife of John Osbeck (also known as Jehan de Werbecque). Osbeck was Flemish and held the occupation of comptroller to the city of Tournai, in present-day Belgium. These family ties are backed up by several municipal archives of Tournai which mention most of the people whom Warbeck declared he was related to. He was taken to Antwerp by his mother at around age ten to learn Dutch. From there, he was undertaken by several masters around Antwerp and Middelburg before being employed by a local English merchant named John Strewe for a few months where he traded cloth.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: After his time in the Netherlands, Warbeck yearned to visit other countries and was hired by a Breton merchant. This merchant eventually brought Warbeck to Cork, Ireland in 1491 when he was about 17, and there he learned to speak English. Warbeck then claims that upon seeing him dressed in silk clothes, some of the citizens of Cork who were Yorkists demanded to do "him the honour as a member of the Royal House of York." He said they did this because they were resolved on gaining revenge on the King of England; they decided that he would claim to be the younger son of the late King Edward IV.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck first claimed the English throne at the court of Burgundy in 1490, where jeton coins were minted for him. Warbeck explained his (i.e. Richard of Shrewsbury's) mysterious disappearance by claiming that his brother Edward V had been murdered, but he had been spared by his brother's (unidentified) murderers because of his age and "innocence". However, he had been made to swear an oath not to reveal his true identity for "a certain number of years". He claimed that from 1483 to 1490, he had lived on the continent of Europe under the protection of Yorkist loyalists, but when his main guardian, Sir Edward Brampton, returned to England, he was left free. He then declared his true identity.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: In 1491, Warbeck landed in Ireland in the hope of gaining support for his claim as Lambert Simnel had four years previously. His cause was promoted by John Atwater, a former Mayor of Cork and ardent Yorkist, who may have been instrumental in helping him assume the identity of Richard. However, little support materialized for an active rebellion, and Warbeck was forced to return to mainland Europe. There his fortunes improved. He was first received by Charles VIII of France, but in 1492 was expelled under the terms of the Treaty of Etaples, by which Charles had agreed not to shelter rebels against Henry VII. Charles VIII agreed to withdraw all backing from Warbeck after an English expedition had laid siege to Boulogne. He was publicly recognized as Richard of Shrewsbury by Margaret of Burgundy, widow of Charles the Bold, sister of Edward IV, and thus the aunt of the Princes in the Tower. Whether Margaret—who left England to marry before either of her nephews were born—truly believed that the pretender was her nephew Richard, or whether she considered him a fraud but supported him anyway, is unknown, but she tutored him in the ways of the Yorkist court.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Henry complained to Philip of Habsburg, Duke of Burgundy, about the harbouring of the pretender. When Henry was ignored, he imposed a trade embargo on Burgundy, cutting off important Burgundian trade connections with England. The pretender was also welcomed by various other monarchs and was known in international diplomacy as the Duke of York. At the invitation of Duke Philip's father, Emperor Maximilian I, in 1493, he attended the funeral of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III and was recognised as King Richard IV of England.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Pro-Yorkist sympathy in England involved important figures making it known that they were prepared to back Warbeck's claims. These included Lord Fitzwater, Sir Simon Montfort, Sir Thomas Thwaites (ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer), Sir William Stanley (the Lord Chamberlain) and Sir Robert Clifford. Clifford went over to mainland Europe and wrote back to his friends to confirm Warbeck's real identity as Prince Richard.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: King Henry ordered the group of supporters to be rounded up and put on trial. All were duly arrested, together with William D'Aubeney, Thomas Cressener, Thomas Astwode, Robert Ratcliff and others. Lord Fitzwater was sent as a prisoner to Calais and later beheaded for trying to bribe his gaolers.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: In show trials in January 1495, all the conspirators were initially condemned to death, although six, including Thwaites, were then pardoned and their sentences commuted to imprisonment and fines. Within days Sir Simon Montfort, Robert Ratcliff and William D'Aubeney were beheaded at Tower Hill and Cressener and Astwode pardoned at the block. Later the same month Sir William Stanley was also beheaded. Other members of the group were imprisoned and fined. Sir Robert Clifford was pardoned and rewarded for revealing the names of the conspirators.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: On 3 July 1495, funded by Margaret of Burgundy, Warbeck landed at Deal in Kent, hoping for a show of popular support. They were confronted by locals loyal to Henry VII in the ensuing Battle of Deal. Warbeck's small army was routed and 150 of the pretender's troops were killed without Warbeck even disembarking. He was forced to retreat almost immediately, this time to Ireland. There he found support from Maurice FitzGerald, 9th Earl of Desmond, and laid siege to Waterford, but, meeting resistance, he fled to Scotland. Henry pardoned Warbeck's Irish supporters, remarking drily that "I suppose they will crown an ape next".


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck was well received by James IV of Scotland, who realised that his presence gave him international leverage. As Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain were negotiating an alliance with Henry VII, James IV knew that Spain would help him in his struggles with England in order to prevent the situation escalating into war with France. Spanish ambassadors arrived in Edinburgh, and later Pedro de Ayala was established as a resident ambassador during the crisis. Warbeck married Lady Catherine Gordon, a daughter of George Gordon, 2nd Earl of Huntly. The marriage was celebrated in Edinburgh with a tournament. James gave Warbeck clothes for the wedding and armour covered with purple silk.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Historian Katie Stevenson suggests the clothing bought for the tournament shows Warbeck fought in a team with the king and four knights. A copy of a love letter in Latin obtained by Pedro de Ayala is thought to be Warbeck's proposal to Lady Catherine. However, James's biographer Norman Macdougall comments that it is clear that nobody, with the possible exception of Margaret of Burgundy, took seriously his claim to be the prince; his marriage to a junior Scots noblewoman was scarcely what might be expected for a potential king of England.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: In September 1496, James IV prepared to invade England with Warbeck. A red, gold and silver banner was made for Warbeck as the Duke of York; James's armour was gilded and painted, and the royal artillery was prepared. John Ramsay of Balmain (who called himself Lord Bothwell) described the events for Henry VII. He saw Roderic de Lalanne, a Flemish knight, arrive with two little ships and 60 German soldiers and meet James IV and talk to Warbeck. In Edinburgh Castle Ramsay saw two great French guns called 'curtalds,' 10 falconets or little serpentines, and 30 iron breech-loading 'cart guns' with 16 close-carts or wagons for the munitions. He estimated the invasion force would last only four to five days in England before it ran out of provisions. He suggested, from the safety of Berwick-upon-Tweed, that the Scots could be vanquished by a modest English force attacking from north and south in a pincer movement.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: The Scottish host assembled near Edinburgh and James IV and Warbeck offered prayers at Holyrood Abbey on 14 September, and on the next day at St Triduana's Chapel and Our Lady Kirk of Restalrig. On 19 September 1496 the Scottish army was at Ellem and on 21 September they crossed the Tweed at Coldstream. Miners set to work to demolish Heaton Castle on 24 September, but the army quickly retreated when resources were expended, and hoped-for support for Perkin Warbeck in Northumberland failed to materialise. According to an English record, the Scots penetrated four miles into England with a royal banner displayed, and destroyed three or four little towers (or Bastle houses). They left on 25 September 1496 when an English army commanded by Lord Neville approached from Newcastle. When news of this invasion reached Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, on 21 October 1496, he wrote to his ambassador in Spain, to request the Spanish monarchs make peace between England and Scotland. The peace mission was entrusted to the Spanish ambassador in Scotland, Pedro de Ayala, who had been Perkin's companion in Northumberland.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Later, wishing to be rid of Warbeck, James IV provided a ship called the "Cuckoo" and a hired crew under a Breton captain, Guy Foulcart. Horses were hired for 30 of Warbeck's companions to ride to the ship at Ayr on 5 July 1497. Pedro de Ayala accompanied Perkin to Ayr. Perkin pawned a horse for cash in Ayr and sailed to Waterford in shame. James IV made peace with England by signing the Treaty of Ayton at St Dionysius's Church in Ayton in Berwickshire. Once again Perkin attempted to lay siege to Waterford, but this time his effort lasted only eleven days before he was forced to flee Ireland, chased by four English ships. According to some sources, by this time he was left with only 120 men on two ships. Bacon's "History of the Reign of King Henry VII" said he had "in his company four small barks, with some sixscore or sevenscore fighting men".


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: On 7 September 1497, Warbeck landed at Whitesand Bay, two miles north of Land's End, in Cornwall hoping to capitalise on the Cornish people's resentment in the aftermath of their uprising only three months earlier. Warbeck proclaimed that he could put a stop to extortionate taxes levied to help fight a war against Scotland and was warmly welcomed. He was declared "Richard IV" on Bodmin Moor and his Cornish army some 6,000 strong entered Exeter before advancing on Taunton. Henry VII sent his chief general, Giles Daubeney, 1st Baron Daubeney, to attack the Cornish and when Warbeck heard that the King's scouts were at Glastonbury he panicked and deserted his army.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck was captured at Beaulieu Abbey in Hampshire where he surrendered. Henry VII reached Taunton on 4 October 1497, where he received the surrender of the remaining Cornish army. The ringleaders were executed and others fined. Warbeck was imprisoned, first at Taunton, then at the Tower of London, where he was "paraded through the streets on horseback amid much hooting and derision of the citizens".


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck was initially treated well by Henry. As soon as he confessed to being an impostor, he was released from the Tower of London and was given accommodation at Henry's court. He was even allowed to be present at royal banquets. He was, however, kept under guard and was not allowed to sleep with his wife, who was living under the protection of the queen.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: After eight months at court, Warbeck tried to escape. He was quickly recaptured. He was then held in the Tower, initially in solitary confinement, and later alongside Edward Plantagenet, 17th Earl of Warwick; the two tried to escape in 1499. Captured once again, Warbeck was led from the Tower to Tyburn, London on 23 November 1499, where he read out a confession and was hanged. Warbeck's Irish ally John Atwater was also executed at Tyburn on the same day. The Earl of Warwick was beheaded on Tower Hill on 28 November 1499.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck was buried in Austin Friars, London. The presumed site of his unmarked grave still exists as the Dutch Church, Austin Friars.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Perkin reportedly resembled Edward IV in appearance, which has led to speculation that he might have been Edward's illegitimate son or at least had some genuine connection with the York family. Francis Bacon believed he was one of Edward's many illegitimate children. It has also been suggested that he was a son of one of Edward's siblings, either Richard III or Margaret of York, Warbeck's first major sponsor.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Some authors, for example Horace Walpole, have even gone as far as to claim that Warbeck actually "was" Richard, Duke of York, although there is little academic support for this view.


title: Perkin Warbeck

text: Warbeck's story subsequently attracted writers, most notably the dramatist John Ford, who dramatized the story in his play "Perkin Warbeck", first performed in the 1630s.


title: Clu Gulager

text: William Martin Gulager (; November 16, 1928 – August 5, 2022), better known as Clu Gulager, was an American television and film actor and director born in Holdenville, Oklahoma. He first became known for his work in television, appearing in the co-starring role of William H. Bonney (Billy the Kid) in the 1960–1962 NBC television series "The Tall Man" and as Emmett Ryker in another NBC Western series, "The Virginian". He later had a second career as a horror film actor, including a lead part in Dan O'Bannon's "The Return of the Living Dead" (1985). He also was in "" (1985). In 2005 he started acting in his son's horror films — the "Feasts" films and "Piranha 3DD" — in his 80s.


title: Clu Gulager

text: Gulager's first major film role was in Don Siegel's "The Killers" (1964) with Lee Marvin and Ronald Reagan in his only movie role as a villain, followed by a supporting part in the racing film "Winning" (1969) opposite Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward; in Peter Bogdanovich's drama "The Last Picture Show" (1971); and opposite John Wayne in "McQ" (1974). In the 1980s, Gulager appeared in several horror films, such as "The Initiation" (1984) and the zombie comedy "The Return of the Living Dead" (1985). In 2005, he appeared in the horror film "Feast", as well as its sequels. He also appeared in the independent film "Tangerine" (2015) and in Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" (2019), which was his final film role.


title: Clu Gulager

text: Gulager directed the short film "A Day with the Boys", which was nominated for the Palme d'Or for Best Short Film at the 1969 Cannes Film Festival.


title: Clu Gulager

text: Gulager was born in Holdenville, Oklahoma, on November 16, 1928, the son of John Delancy Gulager, who had been an actor before settling down to practice law in nearby Muskogee. One source described John Gulager as a cowboy entertainer. His paternal grandmother, Martha Schrimsher Gulager, was a sister of Mary Schrimsher, the mother of Will Rogers, making Gulager and Rogers first cousins, once removed. He was Cherokee, having been an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma.


title: Clu Gulager

text: His Cherokee nickname was given to him by his father for the "clu-clu" birds (known in English as martins, like his middle name) that were nesting at the Gulager home at the time of his birth. From 1946 to 1948, Gulager served in the United States Marine Corps at Camp Pendleton. After attending Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, Gulager transferred to the Baptist-affiliated Baylor University in Waco, Texas, where he graduated. He won a one-year scholarship to study abroad in Paris, where he worked under Jean-Louis Barrault, a French actor and director. In 1952, he returned to Baylor. On June 19, 1952, he married fellow actor Miriam Byrd-Nethery. The couple had two sons, John and Tom, and remained married until her death in 2003.


title: Clu Gulager

text: In 1958 he appeared as Roy Carter in the episode "The Return of Roy Carter" (written by Gene Roddenberry, creator of "Star Trek") in the Western television series "Have Gun – Will Travel" starring Richard Boone.


title: Clu Gulager

text: Gulager stated, "Lew Wasserman saw me on a "Playhouse 90" episode where I played an Elvis Presley-type character. I became the first contract player at Universal". In the spring of 1959, he signed with MCA-TV, where he appeared as Tommy Pavlock in the episode "The Immigrant" of NBC's series "The Lawless Years", a 1920s crime drama. In the fall of 1959, he appeared in the episode "The Temple of the Swinging Doll" of NBC's short-lived espionage drama "Five Fingers", starring David Hedison.


title: Clu Gulager

text: On June 3, 1959, he guest-starred as the unscrupulous photographer Elliott Garrison in "The Andrew Hale Story" on NBC's "Wagon Train". On October 11, 1959, Gulager appeared as a U.S. Navy sailor in the "Appointment at Eleven" episode of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" and again as an escaped convict in "Pen Pal" on November 1, 1960. On "The Untouchables", he played the role of real-life vicious mob killer Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll. Gulager was hailed for his utterly chilling performance as the psychopathic Coll. Late in 1959, he was cast as Beau Chandler in the episode "Jessie Quinn" of the NBC Western series "Riverboat", starring Darren McGavin and Burt Reynolds. The episode is a tale of intrigue involving the Texas Revolution. Capt. Holden attempts to send weapons to Sam Houston, but forces of Antonio López de Santa Anna in Mexico threaten to blow up Holden's vessel, the "Enterprise".


title: Clu Gulager

text: From 1960 to 1962, Gulager played Billy the Kid in "The Tall Man", opposite Barry Sullivan as Sheriff Pat Garrett. The episodes portray Billy as a sympathetic character without resorting to the "misunderstood young man" theme used in such films as "The Outlaw" (1943) and "The Left Handed Gun" (1958). In 1961, Gulager guest-starred in another NBC Western, "Whispering Smith", Audie Murphy's only attempt at series television. Gulager portrayed Deputy Sheriff Emmett Ryker from 1964 to 1968 on "The Virginian," the 90-minute Western series in which he starred with James Drury, Doug McClure, Lee J. Cobb, Roberta Shore, Randy Boone, Gary Clarke, and Diane Roter. Gulager appeared more than 60 times in other roles in film and television, including the film "Winning" (1969) and the CBS series "Three for the Road". He also appeared several times on NBC's "Bonanza". He starred with Lee Marvin, Ronald Reagan, John Cassavetes, and Angie Dickinson in "The Killers" (1964), teaming with Marvin as a pair of ruthless hit men. "The Killers" was intended to be one of the early made-for-TV movies as part of a "Project 120" series of films that did not reach the airwaves, but NBC cited it too violent for broadcast; Universal released the film theatrically instead.


title: Clu Gulager

text: In 1971, Gulager appeared in Peter Bogdanovich's "The Last Picture Show". In 1977, long after his role on "The Virginian", he appeared in Rod Taylor's unsuccessful NBC Western series, "The Oregon Trail", in the episode "The Army Deserter". Gulager also played the boss of Susan Sarandon in a 1977 film drama, "The Other Side of Midnight". In 1981, he co-starred as Angela Channing's long-suffering nephew Chase Gioberti, opposite Oscar Award-winner Jane Wyman, Lorenzo Lamas, William R. Moses, and Jamie Rose, in the pilot episode of "The Vintage Years", which was later retooled as the primetime soap opera "Falcon Crest". When he was not rehired to continue with his role, Robert Foxworth took over the role until his firing in 1987.


title: Clu Gulager

text: In 1985, he was cast as Burt Wilson in Dan O'Bannon's "The Return of the Living Dead". He was also a featured player in director John Landis' darkly comedic 1985 film noir satire, "Into the Night", a film rife with insider Hollywood cameos, as an FBI agent who is a courier of a cache of clandestine funds, which he grudgingly delivers to secure the safety of the film's two romantic leads (Michelle Pfeiffer and Jeff Goldblum).


title: Clu Gulager

text: In 2005, Gulager appeared as a shotgun-toting bartender in "Feast", followed by the film's two sequels, "" (2008), and "" (2009), all of which were directed by his son, John. He also had a minor role in the critically acclaimed independent film "Tangerine" (2015). He had a role in the 2012 film "Piranha 3DD". Gulager's final screen performance was as an unnamed book store owner in Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" in 2019.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Wilma Pearl Mankiller (; November 18, 1945April 6, 2010) was a Native American (Cherokee Nation) activist, social worker, community developer and the first woman elected to serve as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Born in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, she lived on her family's allotment in Adair County, Oklahoma, until the age of 11, when her family relocated to San Francisco as part of a federal government program to urbanize Native Americans. After high school, she married a well-to-do Ecuadorian and raised two daughters. Inspired by the social and political movements of the 1960s, Mankiller became involved in the Occupation of Alcatraz and later participated in the land and compensation struggles with the Pit River Tribe. For five years in the early 1970s, she was employed as a social worker, focusing mainly on children's issues.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Returning to Oklahoma in the fall of 1976, Mankiller was hired by the Cherokee Nation as an economic stimulus coordinator. With her expertise at preparing documentation, she became a successful grant writer, and by the early 1980s was directing the newly created Community Development Department of the Cherokee Nation. As Director she designed and supervised innovative community projects allowing rural citizens to identify their own challenges and, through their labor, participate in solving them. Her project in Bell, Oklahoma, was featured in the movie "The Cherokee Word for Water", directed by Charlie Soap and Tim Kelly. In 2015, the movie was selected as the top American Indian film of the past 40 years by the American Indian Film Institute. Her project in Kenwood received the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Certificate of National Merit.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Her management ability came to the notice of the incumbent Principal Chief, Ross Swimmer, who invited her to run as his deputy in the 1983 tribal elections. When the duo won, she became the first elected woman to serve as Deputy Chief of the Cherokee Nation. In 1985, when Swimmer took a position in the federal administration of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, she was elevated to Principal Chief, serving until 1995. During her administration, the Cherokee government built new health clinics, created a mobile eye-care clinic, established ambulance services, and created early education, adult education and job training programs. She developed revenue streams, including factories, retail stores, restaurants and bingo operations, while establishing self-governance, allowing the tribe to manage its own finances.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: When she retired from politics, Mankiller returned to her activist role as an advocate working to improve the image of Native Americans and combat the misappropriation of native heritage, by authoring books including a bestselling autobiography, "Mankiller: A Chief and Her People", and giving numerous lectures on health care, tribal sovereignty, women's rights and cancer awareness. Throughout her life, she had serious health problems, including polycystic kidney disease, myasthenia gravis, lymphoma and breast cancer, and needed two kidney transplants. She died in 2010 from pancreatic cancer, and was honored with many local, state and national awards, including the nation's highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: In 2021 it was announced that Mankiller's likeness would appear on the quarter-dollar coin as a part of the United States Mint's "American Women Quarters" program.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Wilma Pearl Mankiller was born on November 18, 1945, in the Hastings Indian Hospital in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, to Clara Irene (née Sutton) and Charley Mankiller. Her father was a full-blooded Cherokee, whose ancestors had been forced to relocate to Indian Territory from Tennessee over the Trail of Tears in the 1830s. Her mother descended from Dutch-Irish and English immigrants who had first settled in Virginia and North Carolina in the 1700s. Her maternal grandparents came to Oklahoma in the early 1900s from Georgia and Arkansas, respectively. The surname "Mankiller", "Asgaya-dihi" (Cherokee syllabary: ᎠᏍᎦᏯᏗᎯ) in the Cherokee language, refers to a traditional Cherokee military rank, similar to a captain or major, or a shaman with the ability to avenge wrongs through spiritual methods. Alternative spellings are Outacity and Ontassetè. Wilma's given Cherokee name, meaning flower, was "A-ji-luhsgi". When Charley and Irene married in 1937, they settled on Charley's father, John Mankiller's allotment, known as "Mankiller Flats", near Rocky Mountain in Adair County, Oklahoma, which he had received in 1907 as part of the government policy of forced assimilation for Native American people.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Wilma had five older siblings: Louis Donald "Don", Frieda Marie, Robert Charles, Frances Kay and John David. In 1948, when she was three, the family moved into a house built by her father, her uncle and her brother, Don, on the allotment of her grandfather John. Her five other siblings, Linda Jean, Richard Colson, Vanessa Lou, James Ray and William Edward, were born over the next 12 years. The small house had no electricity or plumbing and they lived in "extreme poverty". The family hunted and fished, maintaining a vegetable garden to feed themselves. They also grew peanuts and strawberries, which they sold. Mankiller went to school through the fifth grade in a three-room schoolhouse, in Rocky Mountain. The family spoke both English and Cherokee at home; even Mankiller's mother spoke Cherokee. Her mother canned food and used flour sacks to make clothes for the children, whom she immersed in Cherokee heritage. Though they joined the Baptist church, the children were wary of white congregants and customs, preferring to attend tribal ceremonial gatherings. Family elders taught the children traditional stories.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: In 1955, a severe drought made it more difficult for the family to provide for itself. As a part of the Indian termination policy, the Indian Relocation Act of 1956 provided assistance to relocate Native families to urban areas. Agents from the Bureau of Indian Affairs promised better jobs and living conditions for families that agreed to move. In 1956, when she was 11, her father Charley was denied a loan from the BIA, and decided that moving to a city where he would have a regular income and a steady job would be good for his family. The family chose California because Irene's mother lived in Riverbank. Selling their belongings, they took a train from Stilwell, Oklahoma, to San Francisco. Though they were promised an apartment in the city, there were no apartments available when the Mankillers arrived. They were housed in a squalid hotel in the Tenderloin District for several weeks. Even when the family moved to Potrero Hill, where both her father and brother Don found work, the family struggled financially. They had few Native American neighbors, creating alienation from their tribal identities.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Mankiller and her siblings enrolled in school, but it was difficult as the other students made fun of her surname and teased her about her clothes and the way she spoke. Her classmates' treatment caused Mankiller to withdraw. Within a year, the family had saved money and were able to move to Daly City, but Mankiller still felt alienated and ran away from home, going to her grandmother's farm in Riverbank. Her grandmother made her return to Potrero, but after Wilma continued to run away, her parents decided to let her live on the farm for a year. By the time she returned, the family had moved again and were living in Hunters Point, a neighborhood riddled with crime, drugs and gangs. Though she had regained her confidence during her year away, Mankiller still felt isolated and began to become involved in the activities of the San Francisco Indian Center. She remained indifferent to school, where she struggled with math and science, but graduated from high school in June 1963.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: As soon as she finished school, Mankiller found a clerical job in a finance company and moved in with her sister Frances. That summer, at a Latin dance, she met Hector Hugo Olaya de Bardi, an Ecuadorian college student from a well-to-do family, and the two began dating. Mankiller found him sophisticated, and despite her parents' discomfort with the union, the two married in Reno, Nevada, on November 13, 1963, and then honeymooned in Chicago. Returning to California, they moved into an apartment in the Mission District, where 10 months later their daughter Felicia was born. They then moved to a house in a nearby neighborhood and in 1966 had a second daughter, Gina. While Olaya continued with his schooling at San Francisco State University and worked for Pan American Airlines, Mankiller was busy raising their daughters. Olaya saw his role as the family's provider, leaving his wife at home to bring up the children. But Mankiller was restless and returned to school, enrolling in classes at Skyline Junior College. For the first time, she enjoyed school and took only courses that interested her.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: In 1964, a small group of Red Power activists occupied Alcatraz Island for a few hours. In the late 1960s, a group of students from the University of California at Berkeley, Los Angeles and Santa Cruz, along with students at San Francisco State, began protesting against the Vietnam War and in favor of civil rights for ethnic minorities and women. Among the groups that sprang up in the period was the American Indian Movement (AIM), which in San Francisco was centered around the activities at the San Francisco Indian Center. Also meeting there was the United Bay Indian Council, which operated as an umbrella organization for 30 separate groups representing people of different tribal affiliations. In October 1969, the Center burned, and the loss of their meeting place created a bond between administrators and student activists, who combined their efforts to bring the plight of urban Native Americans to the public eye with the reoccupation of Alcatraz.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: The occupation inspired Mankiller to become involved in civil rights activism. Prior to the November takeover of the island, she had not been involved in either AIM or the United Bay Council. She began to meet with other Native Americans who had participated in the Indian Center, becoming active in the groups supporting the Occupation. While she did visit Alcatraz, most of her work focused on fundraising and support, gathering supplies of blankets, food and water for those on the island. Soon after the Occupation began, Charley Mankiller was diagnosed with kidney disease, which caused Mankiller to discover that she shared polycystic kidney disease with her father. In between her activism, school and family obligations, she spent as much time with him as she was able. The Occupation lasted 19 months, and during that time, Mankiller learned organizational skills and how to do paralegal research. She had been encouraged by other activists to continue her studies, and began planning a career.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: On her father's death in 1971, the Mankiller family returned to Oklahoma for his burial. When she returned to California, she transferred to San Francisco State University in 1972 and began to focus her classes on social welfare. Against her husband's wishes, she bought her own car and began to seek independence, taking her daughters to Native American events along the West Coast. On her travels, she met members of the Pit River Tribe in Northern California, near Burney, and joined their campaign for compensation with the Indian Claims Commission and Pacific Gas and Electric Company for lands illegally taken from the tribe during the California Gold Rush. Over the next five years, she assisted the tribe in raising funds for its legal defense and helped prepare documentation for their claim, gaining experience in international and treaty law.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: Closer to home, Mankiller founded East Oakland's Native American Youth Center, where she served as director. Locating a building, she called for volunteers to paint and help draft educational programs to help youth learn about their heritage, enjoying overwhelming support from the community. In 1974, Mankiller and Olaya divorced and she moved with her two daughters to Oakland. Taking a position as a social worker with the Urban Indian Resource Center, she worked on programs conducting research on child abuse and neglect, foster care, and adoption of Native children. Recognizing that most indigenous children were placed with families with no knowledge of Native traditions, she worked on legislation with other staff and attorneys to prevent children from being removed from their culture. The law, which eventually passed as the Indian Child Welfare Act, made it illegal to place Native children in non-Native families.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: In 1976, Mankiller's mother returned to Oklahoma, prompting Mankiller to move as well with her two daughters. Initially, she was unable to find work and moved back to California for six months. By the fall, she was back in Oklahoma, and built a small house near her mother's in Mankiller Flats. After doing volunteer work for the Cherokee Nation, Mankiller was hired in 1977 to work on a program for young Cherokees to study environmental science. That same year she enrolled in additional classes at Flaming Rainbow University in Stilwell, Oklahoma, completing her Bachelor of Science degree in social sciences with an emphasis on Indian Affairs, thanks to a correspondence course under a program offered by the Union for Experimental Colleges in Washington, D.C. She enrolled in graduate courses in community development at the University of Arkansas, in Fayetteville, while continuing to work in the tribal offices as an economic stimulus coordinator. She worked on home health care, the Indian child welfare protocols, language services, a senior citizens program and a youth shelter.


title: Wilma Mankiller

text: On November 9, 1979, on her way back to Tahlequah from Fayetteville, Mankiller's vehicle was struck by an oncoming car. Sherry Morris, one of Mankiller's closest friends, was driving the other vehicle and died in the crash. Mankiller suffered broken ribs as well as breaks in her left leg and ankle, and both her face and right leg were crushed. Initially doctors thought that she would not regain the ability to walk. After 17 operations and plastic surgery to reconstruct her face, she was released from the hospital able to walk with crutches. While still in recovery from the accident, three months after the collision, Mankiller began to notice a loss of muscle coordination. She dropped things, was unable to grip items, her voice tired after a few moments of speaking. Doctors thought that the problems were related to the accident, but one day while watching a muscular dystrophy telethon, Mankiller thought her symptoms sounded similar. She called the muscular dystrophy center, was referred to a specialist, and was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis. In November 1980, she returned to the hospital, underwent more surgeries and began a course of chemotherapy, which lasted several years. She went back to work in December.