title: Leporidae

text: Leporids are small to moderately sized mammals, adapted for rapid movement. They have long hind legs, with four toes on each foot, and shorter fore legs, with five toes each. The soles of their feet are hairy, to improve grip while running, and they have strong claws on all of their toes. Leporids also have distinctive, elongated and mobile ears, and they have an excellent sense of hearing. Their eyes are large, and their night vision is good, reflecting their primarily nocturnal or crepuscular mode of living.


title: Leporidae

text: Leporids are all roughly the same shape and fall within a small range of sizes with short tails, ranging from the 21 cm (8 in) long Tres Marias cottontail to the 76 cm (30 in) long desert hare. Female leporids are almost always larger than males, which is unusual among terrestrial mammals, in which males are usually the larger sex.


title: Leporidae

text: Both rabbits and hares are almost exclusively herbivorous (although some "Lepus" species are known to eat carrion), feeding primarily on grasses and herbs, although they also eat leaves, fruit, and seeds of various kinds. They are coprophagous, as they pass food through their digestive systems twice, first expelling it as soft green feces, called cecotropes, which they then reingest, eventually producing hard, dark fecal pellets. Like rodents, they have powerful front incisor teeth, but they also have a smaller second pair of incisors to either side of the main teeth in the upper jaw, and the structure is different from that of rodent incisors. Also like rodents, leporids lack any canine teeth, but they do have more cheek teeth than rodents do. Their jaws also contain a large diastema. The dental formula of most, though not all, leporids is:


title: Leporidae

text: They have adapted to a remarkable range of habitats, from desert to tundra, forests, mountains, and swampland. Rabbits generally dig permanent burrows for shelter, the exact form of which varies between species. In contrast, hares rarely dig shelters of any kind, and their bodies are more suited to fast running than to burrowing.


title: Leporidae

text: The gestation period in leporids varies from around 28 to 50 days, and is generally longer in the hares. This is in part because young hares, or leverets, are born fully developed, with fur and open eyes, while rabbit kits are naked and blind at birth, having the security of the burrow to protect them. Leporids can have several litters a year, which can cause their population to expand dramatically in a short time when resources are plentiful.


title: Leporidae

text: Leporids are typically polygynandrous, and have highly developed social systems. Their social hierarchies determine which males mate when the females go into estrus, which happens throughout the year. Gestation periods are variable, but in general, higher latitudes correspond to shorter gestation periods. Moreover, the gestation time and litter size correspond to predation rates as well. Species nesting below ground tend to have lower predation rates and have larger litters.


title: Leporidae

text: The oldest known leporid species date from the late Eocene, by which time the family was already present in both North America and Asia. Over the course of their evolution, this group has become increasingly adapted to lives of fast running and leaping. For example, "Palaeolagus", an extinct rabbit from the Oligocene of North America, had shorter hind legs than modern forms (indicating it ran rather than hopped) though it was in most other respects quite rabbit-like. Two as yet unnamed fossil finds—dated ~48 Ma (from China) and ~53 Ma (India)—while primitive, display the characteristic leporid ankle, thus pushing the divergence of Ochotonidae and Leporidae yet further into the past.


title: Leporidae

text: Predators of rabbits and hares include raccoons, snakes, eagles, canids, cats, mustelids, owls and hawks. Animals that eat roadkill rabbits include vultures and buzzards.


title: Opium of the people

text: The opium of the people (or opium of the masses) () is a dictum used in reference to religion, derived from a frequently paraphrased statement of German sociologist and economic theorist Karl Marx: "Religion is the opium of the people." In context, the statement is part of Marx's structural-functionalist argument that religion was constructed by people to calm uncertainty over their role in the universe and in society.


title: Opium of the people

text: This statement was translated from the German original, "" and is often rendered as "religion…is the opiate of the "masses"." The full sentence from Marx translates (including italics) as: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the "opium" of the people."


title: Opium of the people

text: The quotation originates from the introduction of Marx's work "A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right", which he started in 1843 but which was not published until after his death. The introduction to this work was published separately in 1844, in Marx's own journal "Deutsch–Französische Jahrbücher", a collaboration with Arnold Ruge. Often quoted only in part, the interpretation of the metaphor in its context has received much less attention.


title: Opium of the people

text: Marx wrote this passage in 1843 as part of the introduction to "Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right", a book that criticized philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's 1820 book, "Elements of the Philosophy of Right". This introduction was published in 1844 in a small journal called "Deutsch–Französische Jahrbücher"; however, the book itself was published posthumously. As the journal had a print run of just 1,000 copies, it had no popular effect during the 19th century. The phrase became better known during the 1930s, when Marxism became more popular.


title: Opium of the people

text: The quotation, in context, reads as follows (italics in original translation):The foundation of irreligious criticism is: "Man makes religion", religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But "man" is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is "the world of man" – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an "inverted consciousness of the world", because they are an "inverted world". Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual "point d’honneur", its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the "fantastic realization" of the human essence since the "human essence" has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle "against that world" whose spiritual "aroma" is religion.


title: Opium of the people

text: "Religious" suffering is, at one and the same time, the "expression" of real suffering and a "protest" against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the "opium" of the people [bold added].


title: Opium of the people

text: The abolition of religion as the "illusory" happiness of the people is the demand for their "real" happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to "give up a condition that requires illusions". The criticism of religion is, therefore, "in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears" of which religion is the "halo".


title: Opium of the people

text: Marx used the phrase to make a structural-functionalist argument about religion, and particularly about organized religion.


title: Opium of the people

text: In his view, religion may be false, but it is a function of something real. Specifically, Marx believed that religion had certain practical functions in society that were similar to the function of opium in a sick or injured person: it reduced people's immediate suffering and provided them with pleasant illusions which gave them the strength to carry on. In this sense, while Marx may have no sympathy for religion itself, he has deep sympathy for those proletariat who put their trust in it.


title: Opium of the people

text: However, Marx also saw religion as harmful to revolutionary goals: by focusing on the eternal rather than the temporal, religion turns the attention of the oppressed away from the exploitation and class structure that encompasses their everyday lives. In the process, religion helps to foster a kind of false consciousness that emboldens cultural values and beliefs that support and validate the continued dominance of the ruling class. It thereby prevents the socialist revolution, the overthrowing of capitalism, and the establishment of a classless, socialist society.


title: Opium of the people

text: In Marx’s view, once workers finally overthrow capitalism, unequal social relations will no longer need legitimating and people’s alienation will dissolve, along with any need for religion.


title: Opium of the people

text: Subsequent socialist leaders and theorists have reflected and expanding on Marx's metaphor and considered it in the context of their own national conditions.


title: Opium of the people

text: Those who toil and live in want all their lives are taught by religion to be submissive and patient while here on earth, and to take comfort in the hope of a heavenly reward. But those who live by the labour of others are taught by religion to practise charity while on earth, thus offering them a very cheap way of justifying their entire existence as exploiters and selling them at a moderate price tickets to well-being in heaven. Religion is opium for the people []. Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves of capital drown their human image [], their demand for a life more or less worthy of man. (emphasis added).


title: Opium of the people

text: North Korean leader Kim Il Sung's writings addressed the "opium" metaphor twice, both in the context of responding to comrades who object to working with religious groups (Chonbulygo and Chondoism). In the first instance, Kim replies that a person is "mistaken" if he or she believes Marx's proposition regarding "opium of the people" can be applied in all instances, explaining that if a religion "prays for dealing out divine punishment to Japan and blessing the Korean nation" then it is a "patriotic religion" and its believers are patriots. In the second, Kim states that Marx's metaphor "must not be construed radically and unilaterally" because Marx was warning against "the temptation of a religious mirage and not opposing believers in general." Because the communist movement in Korea was fighting a struggle for "national salvation" against Japan, Kim writes that anyone with a similar agenda can join the struggle and that "even a religionist ... must be enrolled in our ranks without hesitation."


title: Opium of the people

text: Roland Boer asserts that Marx's depiction of religion as 'opium', while suspicious of religion's addictive potential, also emphasizes religion's medicinal properties akin to those of opium in Western medicine.


title: Opium of the people

text: Welcome be a religion that pours into the bitter chalice of the suffering human species some sweet, soporific drops of spiritual opium, some drops of love, hope and faith.


title: Opium of the people

text: The writings of Bruno Bauer are a key influence on the "Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right". Marx's metaphor is anticipated in two of Bauer's works: "Die gute Sache der Freiheit" and "Der christliche Staat". In the former work, Bauer talks of religion as a cause of "opium-like stupefaction;" in the latter, Bauer mentions theology's "opium-like" influence.


title: Opium of the people

text: Charles Kingsley, a canon of the Church of England, wrote the following in 1847, four years after Marx:


title: Opium of the people

text: Miguel de Unamuno, the famed Spanish author of the Generation of '98, focused his nivola "San Manuel Bueno, mártir" around the theme of religion's opiatic effect on the people of rural Spain. In the book, the protagonist Don Manuel is a priest who does not believe in God, but continues preaching because he sees the positive impact he can make in the lives of his parishioners. Religion in this way also serves to cure his own deep depression, through the happiness he feels from helping the people of Valverde de Lucerna. Unamuno makes direct reference to Marx when Don Manuel explains:


title: Opium of the people

text: Some writers make a modern comparison of the phrase "opium of the people" to that akin to sports fandom, celebrities, the distractions of television, the internet, and other entertainment, etc. This can be seen as a parallel to the concept of bread and circuses.


title: Agora (film)

text: Agora () is a 2009 English-language Spanish historical drama film directed by Alejandro Amenábar and written by Amenábar and Mateo Gil. The biopic stars Rachel Weisz as Hypatia, a mathematician, philosopher and astronomer in late 4th-century Roman Egypt, who investigates the flaws of the geocentric Ptolemaic system and the heliocentric model that challenges it. Surrounded by religious turmoil and social unrest, Hypatia struggles to save the knowledge of classical antiquity from destruction. Max Minghella co-stars as Davus, Hypatia's father's slave, and Oscar Isaac as Hypatia's student, and later prefect of Alexandria, Orestes.


title: Agora (film)

text: The story uses historical fiction to highlight the relationship between religion and science at the time amidst the decline of Greco-Roman polytheism and the Christianization of the Roman Empire. The title of the film takes its name from the "agora", a public gathering place in ancient Greece, similar to the Roman "forum". The film was produced by Fernando Bovaira and shot on the island of Malta from March to June 2008. Justin Pollard, co-author of "The Rise and Fall of Alexandria" (2007), was the historical adviser for the film.


title: Agora (film)

text: "Agora" was screened out of competition at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival in May, and opened in Spain on 9 October 2009 becoming the highest-grossing film of the year for that country. Although the film had difficulty finding distribution, it was released country by country throughout late 2009 and early 2010. The film received a 53% overall approval rating from Rotten Tomatoes and seven Goya Awards in Spain, including Best Original Screenplay. It was awarded the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Feature Film Prize at the Hamptons International Film Festival. It has also received sharp criticism for historical inaccuracies; one authoritative reference work on the history of science rebuked the film as "spectacularly anachronistic".


title: Agora (film)

text: In 391 AD, Alexandria is part of the Roman Empire, and Greek philosopher Hypatia is a teacher at the Platonic school, where future leaders are educated. Hypatia is the daughter of Theon, the director of the Musaeum of Alexandria. Hypatia, her father's slave, Davus, and two of her pupils, Orestes and Synesius, are immersed in the changing political and social landscape. She rejects Orestes's love as she prefers to devote herself to science. Davus assists Hypatia in her classes and is interested in science. He is also secretly in love with her.


title: Agora (film)

text: Meanwhile, social unrest begins challenging the Roman rule of the city as Pagans and Christians come into conflict. When the Christians start verbally insulting the statutes of the pagan gods, the pagans, including Orestes and Theon, ambush the Christians. However, in the ensuing battle, the pagans unexpectedly find themselves outnumbered by a large Christian mob. Theon is gravely injured, and Hypatia and the pagans take refuge in the Library of the Serapeum. The Christian siege of the library ends when an envoy of the Roman Emperor Theodosius I declares that the pagans are pardoned, but the Christians shall be allowed to take possession of the library. Hypatia and the pagans flee while trying to save the most important scrolls before the Christians overtake the library and destroy its contents. Davus chooses to join the Christian forces. He later returns with a gladius and sexually assaults her, but he begins to sob and offers his sword to her. However, she removes his slave collar and tells him that he is free.


title: Agora (film)

text: Several years later, Orestes, now converted to Christianity, is prefect of Alexandria. Hypatia continues to investigate the motions of the Sun, the Moon, the five known "wanderers" (planets), and the stars. Some Christians ridicule the thinking that the Earth is a sphere by arguing that people far from the top would fall off the Earth. When they ask Davus what his opinion is, he avoids conflict by saying that only God knows these things.


title: Agora (film)

text: Hypatia also investigates the heliocentric model of the solar system proposed by Aristarchus of Samos by having an object dropped from the mast of a moving ship which demonstrates that a possible motion of the Earth would not affect the motion, relative to Earth, of a falling object on Earth. However, due to religious objections against heliocentrism, the Christians have now forbidden Hypatia to teach at the school. The Christians and the Jews come into violent conflict.


title: Agora (film)

text: The leader of the Christians, Cyril, views Hypatia as having too much influence over Orestes and stages a public ceremony intended to force Orestes to subjugate her. Hypatia's former pupil, Synesius, now the Bishop of Cyrene, comes to her rescue as a religious authority counterweight but says he cannot help her unless she accepts Christianity; she refuses. Hypatia theorizes that the Earth orbits around the Sun in an elliptic orbit, not a circular orbit, with the Sun at one of the foci. Cyril convinces a mob of Christians that Hypatia is a witch, and they vow to kill her. Davus tries to run ahead to warn Hypatia, but she is captured. They strip Hypatia and are about to skin her alive until Davus persuades the mob otherwise, and they decide to stone her instead. When the mob goes outside to collect stones, Davus suffocates her to spare her the pain of being stoned and tells the mob that she fainted. Davus leaves as they begin to stone her.


title: Agora (film)

text: After Amenábar completed "The Sea Inside" (2004), he took a break and traveled to the island of Malta, where he used his free time to explore the night sky. Seeing the Milky Way galaxy, Amenábar began to discuss astronomy with his friends, speculating about extraterrestrial life on other planets. He started to research astronomy and came across "", by American astronomer Carl Sagan. Amenábar also studied historical figures such as Ptolemy, Copernicus, Johannes Kepler and Galileo, but found himself most interested in the story of Hypatia, a 4th-century Greek astronomer whose history, he felt, was still relevant in the 21st century: "We realized that this particular time in the world had a lot of connections with our contemporary reality. Then the project became really, really intriguing, because we realized that we could make a movie about the past while actually making a movie about the present."


title: Agora (film)

text: To prepare for the task of recreating the ancient city of Alexandria without relying on computer generated imagery, Amenábar reviewed older sword-and-sandal films such as "The Ten Commandments" (1956), "Ben-Hur" (1959), and "Pharaoh" (1966). A year before the start of pre-production, designer Guy Hendrix Dyas spent three weeks with Amenábar in Madrid to do some preliminary work on the set designs and the recreation of the ancient city of Alexandria so that previous animations could be generated.


title: Agora (film)

text: The film was produced by Fernando Bovaira, with Telecinco Cinema as the primary producer alongside MOD Producciones and Himenóptero and it had the participation of Canal+ España.


title: Agora (film)

text: Principal photography began on March 17, 2008, on the island of Malta, and was scheduled to last 15 weeks. Production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas used large sets on location instead of computer generated imagery at Amenábar's direction. The construction of the set employed almost 400 people, and was the largest ever designed on the island. Actor Charles Thake (Hesiquius) suffered minor facial injuries on the set when he collided with extras running during a scene. Filming ended in June.


title: Agora (film)

text: "Agora" premiered at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, but the film was initially unable to find a domestic distributor due to its large budget and length. The film also had trouble finding a distributor in both the United States and Italy, although it eventually found distributors in both countries. The North America premiere was held at the Toronto International Film Festival in September, 2009. "Agora" opened in Spain on October 9, 2009, breaking box office records for that country. A limited release in the United States began on May 28, 2010, opening on two screens at the Paris Theatre and the Sunshine Cinema in New York City. The film opened on the West Coast of the United States on June 4, playing only two screens: at The Landmark theatre in Los Angeles and at Regal's Westpark 8 in Irvine.


title: Agora (film)

text: In March 2010, "Agora" was released in Region 2-locked DVD and Blu-ray formats. A Region 1-locked DVD was released October 2010.


title: Agora (film)

text: British writer and film critic Peter Bradshaw, of "The Guardian", praised Alejandro Amenábar and his film, describing "Agora" as "an ambitious, cerebral and complex movie... Unlike most toga movies, it doesn't rely on CGI spectacle, but real drama and ideas." Bradshaw also applauded Rachel Weisz's role as Hypatia, calling it "an outstanding performance".


title: Agora (film)

text: American screenwriter and critic Roger Ebert liked the film and gave it three stars out of four. He said: "I went to see "Agora" expecting an epic with swords, sandals and sex. I found swords and sandals, some unexpected opinions about sex, and a great deal more."


title: Agora (film)

text: The film holds a 53% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 93 reviews with an average score of 5.7/10.


title: Agora (film)

text: Before its release, the distribution company insisted on screening the film at the Vatican. No objections were reported and Vatican officials assisted in some of the religious depictions. According to Amenábar, "There’s one scene in which Cyril reads from St. Paul and [the Vatican] tried to look for the softest version. In the English version, [it is] taken from the King James version of the Bible." The line is excerpted from .


title: Agora (film)

text: The Religious Anti-Defamation Observatory (Observatorio Antidifamación Religiosa), a Spanish Catholic group, claimed that the film was responsible for "promoting hatred of Christians and reinforcing false clichés about the Catholic Church." Michael Ordoña of the "Los Angeles Times" acknowledges that the film has been criticized for "perceived slights against Christians" but that "its lack of condemnation of specific dogma makes the film's target seem to be fundamentalism in general".


title: Agora (film)

text: In contrast, the New York-based Rev. Philip Grey wrote a positive review of the film and strongly recommended it: "Christians who see themselves in the fanatic, murderous monks of the film and feel offended need to do some serious soul-searching. (...) Hypatia as depicted in the film is firmly opposed to what, in her time and at her city, is offered—or rather, imposed by brute force—under the name of 'Christianity'. Nevertheless, she seems to me far more a follower of the precepts of Christianity than are her persecutors and tormentors. (...) In particular, in watching the deeply moving final scene, her going calmly to her death amidst the jeering mob, I could not help but strongly recall Jesus Christ on his own way to Golgotha".


title: Agora (film)

text: "Agora" was Spain's highest-grossing film of 2009, earning over $10.3 million within four days of its release on October 9.


title: Agora (film)

text: Based on North American theatre tracking data from Rentrak Theatrical, "indieWIRE" reported that "Agora" "scored the highest per-theater-average of any film in the marketplace" during the Memorial Day holiday weekend from May 28 through May 31, just after its U.S. limited release. Despite this very high per-theater average, "Agora" was never widely released in the United States. According to Box Office Mojo, its widest release in the United States was just 17 theaters.


title: Agora (film)

text: The film grossed over $32.3 million (€21.4 million) by 1 December 2009, and about $35 million by 1 February 2010. As of 10 January 2011, "Agora"'s worldwide box office earnings were approximately $39 million. DVD and Blu-ray sales numbers are not publicly available.


title: Agora (film)

text: "Agora" was nominated for 13 Goya Awards, winning 7. The film won the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Feature Film Prize (US$25,000) in 2009 at the Hamptons International Film Festival.


title: Agora (film)

text: "The Cambridge History of Science" has described the film as "spectacularly anachronistic", singling out the film's portrayal of Hypatia's fictional discovery the law of free fall and heliocentric orbits for criticism.


title: Agora (film)

text: Antonio Mampaso, a Spanish astrophysicist and one of "Agora"'s scientific advisors, stated in an interview that "We know that Hypatia lived in Alexandria in the IV and V centuries CE, until her death in 415. Only three primary sources mention Hypatia of Alexandria, apart from other secondary ones". He added that none of Hypatia's work has survived but it is thought, from secondary sources, that her main fields of study and work were geometry and astronomy. Mampaso dubiously claimed that Hypatia invented the hydrometer, an instrument still in use today, and that probably her father Theon of Alexandria, together with Hypatia, invented the astrolabe. However, it is generally accepted that the astrolabe had already been invented a couple of centuries earlier, and that the instrument was known to the Greeks before the Christian era. Similarly, the hydrometer was invented before Hypatia, and already known in her time. In this regard, Pappus of Alexandria was recorded as using the hydrometer before Hypatia was even born. Synesius sent Hypatia a letter describing a hydrometer, and requesting her to have one constructed for him. There is no evidence that the historical Hypatia ever studied the heliocentric model proposed by Aristarchus of Samos or that she ever found any evidence to support it.


title: Agora (film)

text: The set used in the film is meticulously historically authentic, showing a blend of Greek, Roman, and Egyptian architectural styles that would have been fitting to the time period, but the costumes are anachronistic. The Roman soldiers are shown wearing generic armor and weapons resembling the type used in the first century AD, but the film is actually set in the fifth century AD, by which time Roman troops no longer wore leather armor and would have instead worn scale armor or chain mail.


title: Agora (film)

text: The film contains conflicting information regarding the fate of the Library of Alexandria and Hypatia's life. In one scene, inspired by the final episode of Carl Sagan's "", Christian rioters, under the decree of Pope Theophilus, appeared to burn the "Great Library"; however, no records of the historical Library of Alexandria existed anymore at the time Hypatia was born. The last references to anyone having held membership in the Mouseion, the larger research community associated with the Library, date to the 260s AD. Theon was the head of a school called the "mouseion", but it was probably another school named after the Hellenistic cult of the Muses. There is, however, one very brief mention in the film that the library where most of the action happens is the "daughter" library. Although the Serapeum of Alexandria did at some point house scrolls from the Great Library, it is uncertain whether there were any scrolls at the time of its destruction in 391 AD (some sources prior to that date speak of them in the past tense). In the film, Christians rioters merely knock over all the statues and burn the scrolls, whereas in reality they completely demolished the Serapeum to the ground, leaving no part of its structure intact. "Agora" also strongly implies that Hypatia was an atheist, which directly contradicts the historical fact that she was a Neoplatonist follower of the teachings of Plotinus, who believed that the goal of philosophy was "a mystical union with the divine."


title: Agora (film)

text: Robert Barron, an American Catholic priest, writes in an article: "Hypatia was indeed a philosopher and she was indeed killed by a mob in 415, but practically everything else about the story that Gibbon and Sagan and Amenábar tell is false". Irene A. Artemi, a doctor of theology at Athens University, states that "The movie—albeit seemingly not turning against the Christian religion—is in fact portraying the Christians as fundamentalist, obscurantist, ignorant and fanatic". Similarly, atheist blogger Tim O'Neill remarks: "Over and over again, elements are added to the story that are not in the source material: the destruction of the library, the stoning of the Jews in the theatre, Cyril condemning Hypatia's teaching because she is a woman, the heliocentric "breakthrough" and Hypatia's supposed irreligiosity." Edward J. Watts, though recognising the emotive power of the film, is critical of the film's historical distortions, such as changing philosophical insights into scientific inventions and discoveries to cater to a modern audience, fictional gender-based threats to Hypatia and visually lumping the monks together with the Taliban, that devalue Hypatia's own life and mischaracterise later centuries.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby American, Inc. is an American high performance vehicle manufacturer founded by former race car driver Carroll Shelby. The Shelby American name has been used by several legally distinct corporations founded by Shelby since his original shop in Venice, California began operation in 1962. The current iteration is a wholly owned subsidiary of Carroll Shelby International, Inc. (), a holding company formed in 2003. Carroll Shelby International's other wholly owned subsidiary is Carroll Shelby Licensing, which licenses the name and trademarks associated with Shelby to other companies (including Shelby American). Shelby American was the first automobile manufacturer in the state of Nevada. Shelby American manufactures component automobiles, including replicas of the small-block and large-block AC Cobras, the Shelby GT350 and the GT500 Super Snake. Since 2005, Shelby American has released new models each year.


title: Shelby American

text: In 1957 racing driver Carroll Shelby opened a sports car dealership in Dallas, with fellow racer Jim Hall and Hall's older brother Dick, selling Maseratis across the American Southwest. They raced Maseratis in the 1957 SCCA National Sports Car Championship, while across the Atlantic Brian Lister's Lister Motor Company enjoyed racing success after installing a Jaguar XK engine in his sports cars. Shelby and Hall met Lister in England with the idea of swapping a Chevrolet small-block engine into the Lister body. They returned to Dallas with six cars, five of which they sold and the sixth they transplanted the Chevrolet engine into, which Hall raced in the SCCA National Championship. This was Shelby's first experience putting an American V8 engine into a British sports car body.


title: Shelby American

text: With funding from oil driller and amateur racer Gary Laughlin, in 1959 Hall and Shelby approached General Motors with the idea of creating a new sports car using the Chevrolet Corvette chassis and engine, but with an aluminum body much lighter than the factory-built Corvette, in order to make a competitive touring car. Three cars were delivered and had new bodies designed by Carrozzeria Scaglietti installed, but after the initial three cars GM executives refused to sell them more rolling chassis, worried that the "Scaglietti Corvettes" would compete with GM's own car for sales.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby continued sports cars racing in the late 1950s, competed in Formula 1 for Aston Martin in 1958 and 1959, won the 1959 24 Hours of Le Mans and the 1960 USAC Road Racing Championship, but was forced into retirement following the 1960 season due to his persistent angina caused by a congenital heart defect.


title: Shelby American

text: In 1961 Shelby founded the Shelby School of High Performance Driving at Riverside International Raceway near Los Angeles, hiring Pete Brock as a teacher, and obtained a distributorship for Goodyear tires and Champion spark plugs. He rented space for these other businesses from Dean Moon, at his shop Santa Fe Springs, California.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby contacted several European automakers with the purpose of striking a deal to import their chassis and install an American V8, but he was rebuffed until September 1961, when AC Cars of Britain replied in the affirmative. After the Bristol Aeroplane Company merged with English Electric and Vickers to form the British Aircraft Corporation, the newly spun-off Bristol Cars ceased production of their six-cylinder engine, which AC had been using in their Ace sports car. In need of a new supply of engines they struck a deal with Shelby: they would ship bodies from their shop in Thames Ditton, Surrey to Shelby in California for installation of an American V8 engine, if a suitable one could be found. Shelby returned to GM, asking for a supply of Chevrolet V8s, but was refused again for fear a Chevrolet-powered European sports car would compete with the Corvette. Instead he sought an agreement with Ford, who were releasing a new "small-block" V8 engine of their own at the end of the year.


title: Shelby American

text: In November 1961 Ford delivered a pair of "Windsor" V8 engines to Moon's shop, and AC's first body arrived in February 1962. Shelby and Moon installed the V8 engine and a Borg-Warner T-10 transmission into the AC body, creating the first of the cars Shelby named "Cobra".


title: Shelby American

text: In order to expand production Shelby needed a facility of his own. Coincidentally Lance Reventlow's lease at his shop in Venice, Los Angeles, where his company built Scarab racing cars, was expiring. Shelby leased the building at 1042 Princeton Drive in April and founded his new company: Shelby American, Inc. Phil Remington, Scarab's chief engineer, was hired immediately by Shelby to continue working on the Cobra.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby American began racing the Cobra in the fall of 1962 with driver Bill Krause entered into the three-hour endurance race at the Los Angeles Times Grand Prix on October 13. Krause ultimately did not finish, having broken an axle shaft, but the car was very competitive with the then-new Corvette Sting Ray Z06, which was also making its racing debut.


title: Shelby American

text: Cobras dominated the SCCA United States Road Racing Championship in 1963, but the car was less successful in the FIA World Sportscar Championship. The Cobra's open-top body simply wasn't aerodynamic enough to allow the car to reach the higher top speeds its hardtop coupe competitors were capable of, particularly the Ferrari 250 GTO. For the 1964 season Shelby had Pete Brock design a new aerodynamic body for the Cobra chassis, which would make the car capable of speeds over 190 mph. The new car became known as the "Daytona", named for its inaugural race at the Daytona International Speedway. Only one Daytona coupe was completed at Shelby American; the other five cars prepared for the 1964 World Sportscar Championship had their bodywork completed at Carrozzeria Gransport in Modena, Italy.


title: Shelby American

text: Driven by Dan Gurney and Bob Bondurant, the Shelby American Daytona finished first in the GT classes and fourth overall at the 1964 24 Hours of Le Mans, bested only by the prototype Ferrari 275 P and 330 P. The Ford Motor Company's new prototype, the GT40, fared poorly; none of the three cars entered into the race finished. After the end of the Bahamas Speed Week in December—marking the end of the 1964 season—Ford handed control of the GT40 program to Shelby American from Carroll Shelby's old associate John Wyer (who ran the Aston Martin racing program when Shelby won Le Mans in 1959).


title: Shelby American

text: Under Shelby's management the GT40 driven by Lloyd Ruby and Ken Miles won the first race of the 1965 season at Daytona, and Miles and Bruce McLaren finished first in the prototype class and second overall at the next race at Sebring, but otherwise the GT40 program was a disappointment overall, once again failing to finish at Le Mans. By contrast the Shelby Daytona coupe had great success for Shelby, winning the GT Division III class on the strength of class wins at Daytona, Sebring, Monza and the Nürburgring. With the Shelby Daytona, Shelby became the first American constructor to win a title on the international scene in the FIA International Championship for GT Manufacturers in the 1965 season.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby American worked with Ford to re-engineer the GT40 for the '66 season, replacing the 289 cubic inch (4.7 L) engine with Ford's larger, more powerful 427 cu. in. (7.0 L) engine. The Mk II GT40 achieved great success, with Shelby American's wins at Daytona, Sebring and Le Mans earning Ford the International Manufacturer's Championship in 1966. Shelby American cars finished first (Miles & Ruby again) and second (Gurney & Jerry Grant) at Daytona, first at Sebring (Miles & Ruby), and first (McLaren & Chris Amon) and second (Miles & Denny Hulme) at Le Mans. Gurney and Grant would have finished second at Sebring except their car broke down on the last lap and Gurney pushed it across the finish line, automatically disqualifying them.


title: Shelby American

text: During the 1966 season Shelby and Ford were already developing a more advanced version of the GT40, known early in its development as the "J-car". On August 17, 1966, only a couple months after the race at Le Mans, Ken Miles died at the wheel of a J-car while conducting high-speed testing at Riverside. The J-car was re-engineered with improved safety features and better aerodynamics, becoming the GT40 Mk IV. In 1967 the Mk IV won the only two races they entered, at Sebring and Le Mans. McLaren and Mario Andretti won the race at Sebring, while Gurney and A. J. Foyt won Le Mans, with McLaren and Mark Donohue in fourth.


title: Shelby American

text: After the 1967 season the FIA changed the rules governing prototypes, and the 7.0 L engine used in the Mk II and Mk IV GT40s became redundant. Ford wound up the Ford Advanced Vehicles group and Shelby American withdrew from the World Sportscar Championship, transferring control back to John Wyer's J.W. Automotive Engineering (JWA). JWA GT40s won the 1968 and 1969 races at Le Mans, giving the GT40 program an unprecedented four consecutive wins (matched only by the Porsche 956 in the 1980s).


title: Shelby American

text: While Shelby American was building and racing Cobras and Daytonas, Ford introduced the new Mustang at the New York World's Fair in April, 1964. Ford vice-president Lee Iacocca promised that the car would be "a sports car suitable for street use or competition" in his introductory speech to the press. In reality the car's sporting credentials were somewhat lacking, and Iacocca hired Shelby American to develop a version of the car suitable for racing.


title: Shelby American

text: The Shelby Mustang GT350 was created, with upgraded intake and exhaust manifolds, carburetor, rear axle and brakes installed at Shelby American's shop in California in place of the standard Ford parts.


title: Shelby American

text: With work on the GT40 program and production of the GT350 beginning to ramp up Shelby American ran out of space at their shop in Venice, moving instead to an aircraft hangar at Los Angeles International Airport in 1965. The facility is still in existence, renovated in 1996 it is now the location of the Qantas Freight cargo terminal located at 6555 W Imperial Hwy, Los Angeles CA 90045. Inside the steel tracks used to move the cars during assembly are still partially visible. The GT350 was very successful in the SCCA B-Production class, winning the class three consecutive years.


title: Shelby American

text: The offerings from Shelby American were expanded in 1966 to include an optional automatic transmission, and Shelby famously built special edition GT350s for Hertz. Hertz was a Ford subsidiary at the time, and when the cars were returned by Hertz to Ford they were re-sold to the public as the "GT350H".


title: Shelby American

text: For 1967 Shelby installed the Ford 428 cu. in (7.0 L) engine in the Mustang, creating the "GT500". Revised front and rear fascias distinguished the 1967 Shelby Mustangs from the common Fords they were based on. Shelby ran a separate racing team, "Terlingua Racing", in the 1967 Trans-American Sedan Championship, with Jerry Titus winning the championship driving a GT350.


title: Shelby American

text: The sales of Shelby Mustangs increased six-fold from 1966 to 1967, and for 1968 Ford encouraged Shelby to move production from California to Michigan to simplify the logistics of shipping bare Ford Mustangs from their plant in New Jersey to Shelby. In November, 1967 Shelby American's operations were split into three separate companies. Shelby Automotive, the Mustang production arm, was set up in Livonia, Michigan and actual production moved to the facilities of fibreglass supplier A. O. Smith in nearby Ionia. The Shelby Racing Company moved from the hangar at LAX to a new office in Torrance, California. The Shelby Parts Company (later renamed to Shelby Autosports) moved to Torrance, and later to the Detroit area.


title: Shelby American

text: After 1968 Ford took functional control of the Shelby Mustang design and production, moving production in-house for the 1969 model year. After the 1969 racing season Shelby withdrew from competition. Carroll Shelby announced he was retiring from the automotive business in January, 1970, and Shelby American and its subsidiaries were essentially defunct.


title: Shelby American

text: Carroll Shelby maintained ownership of his Goodyear tire distributorship and set up the Shelby Wheel Company in 1971 in Gardena, California, producing and selling aftermarket aluminum wheels, but he remained otherwise out of the automotive industry until 1982. His old friend Lee Iacocca had become president and CEO of the Chrysler Corporation, and contacted him with a proposition: Chrysler would set up a new Chrysler-Shelby Performance Center in Santa Fe Springs, California (not far from Dean Moon's shop where the first Cobra was assembled) so that Shelby could assist Chrysler's engineers to create high-performance versions of their cars, similar to his relationship with Ford almost 20 years earlier.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby assisted with the creation of the 1983 Dodge Shelby Charger, a two-door performance variant of the front-wheel drive Dodge Omni. For 1984 Shelby assisted with the Omni GLH, named by Shelby as an initialism for "Goes Like Hell". The front-wheel drive cars were powered by turbocharged four-cylinder engines, with design improvements more focused on handling than all-out power.


title: Shelby American

text: With the success of the Shelby Charger and Omni GLH Carroll Shelby set up a new company similar to the original Shelby American. Shelby Automobiles, Inc. was founded in 1983 and began operation in 1985 out of a shop in Whittier, California, near the Chrysler-Shelby Performance Center, producing performance versions of Chrysler cars. The first product was the 1986 GLHS, a higher-performance version of the Omni GLH. With raised boost pressure and an intercooler the GLHS's 2.2 L engine produced 175 hp—29 more than the GLH, and about 85% more than the standard Omni. With new suspension components to improve the car's handling its performance equalled or bettered its V8-powered, rear-wheel drive contemporaries from Ford and General Motors, and even surpassed the 1965 Shelby GT350.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby Automobiles produced special editions of the Charger (1987 GLHS), Dodge Lancer (Shelby Lancer), Dodge Shadow (Shelby CSX) and Dodge Dakota pickup truck (Shelby Dakota), before ceasing operations in 1990. Carroll Shelby consulted on the development of the Dodge Viper, but Shelby Automobiles was defunct, just as Shelby American was 20 years earlier.


title: Shelby American

text: Carroll Shelby founded the Shelby American Management Company in 1982 to manage his many other business ventures. His business associate and president of the company, Don Landy, floated the idea of creating an entirely new Shelby branded sports car in the mid-1990s. Landy approached General Motors' Cadillac division, which had recently begun production of a new double overhead camshaft V8 engine called "Northstar", with the idea of Cadillac being the exclusive supplier of engines for this proposed new sports car. Landy was rebuffed so he approached Oldsmobile, who were building a 4.0 L version of the new V8 engine for their Aurora sedan. Oldsmobile had been in a significant sales decline since the late 1980s and Oldsmobile general manager John Rock believed the Shelby sports car had the potential to reinvigorate Oldsmobile in the same way that Shelby's involvement with Chrysler and the Dodge Viper reinvigorated the Dodge brand.


title: Shelby American

text: A new Shelby American, Inc. was founded in 1995 in Las Vegas. Don Landy was replaced by another of Carroll Shelby's business associates, Don Rager, and design of the new car began at Shelby's shop in Gardena, California while a new assembly plant was being built near the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.


title: Shelby American

text: The new car, called Series 1, was shown as prototypes at the Los Angeles Auto Show and North American International Auto Show in Detroit in 1997.


title: Shelby American

text: Unlike the arrangements Shelby American had with Ford and Shelby Automobiles had with Chrysler, financial support for the Series 1 came not directly from General Motors. Instead a select number of Oldsmobile dealers were sold the exclusive rights to sell the Series 1 cars for a $50,000-per-car deposit. This financial arrangement became untenable by 1998 and a 75% share of Shelby American was sold to Venture Corporation, supplier of the car's exterior body panels and many interior trim pieces. The production of Cobra replicas was not part of the transfer of ownership, with Shelby retaining those rights.


title: Shelby American

text: Cars finally began delivery to customers in the summer of 1999, but initial build quality was very poor. Deliveries of finished cars did not resume until August, 2000.


title: Shelby American

text: Venture Holdings was forced into bankruptcy by the bankruptcy of one of its other subsidiaries in 2003. Soon thereafter Carroll Shelby formed a new holding company called "Carroll Shelby International, Inc.", and it was taken public. A new Shelby Automobiles was also created as a manufacturing arm of the new company.


title: Shelby American

text: In 2004 Shelby Automobiles purchased Shelby American and the assets to the Series 1 model. On December 15, 2009, Carroll Shelby International announced in a press release that Shelby Automobiles was being renamed to "Shelby American" in celebration of the 45th anniversary of the 427 Cobra and GT350.


title: Shelby American

text: Carroll Shelby International was previously working with Texas-based Unique Performance to create new Mustang-based Shelby cars such as the GT350SR and "Eleanor". On November 1, 2007, Unique Performance was raided by the Farmers Branch Police Department due to VIN irregularities and subsequently declared bankruptcy, which effectively ended the Shelby continuation "Eleanor" production and the relationship.


title: Shelby American

text: The Shelby Museum is located on site in Las Vegas, NV. It includes a wide range of Shelby vehicles, from the first Cobra CSX2000 to prototypes of Series 1 and some of the latest creations.


title: Shelby American

text: With the worldwide release of the sixth generation Ford Mustang, including right-hand-drive markets, Shelby American began to partner with top-tier automobile modification shops internationally. These partnerships enable customers in other countries to purchase Shelby products locally rather than have to import cars from the United States.


title: Shelby American

text: Mustang Motorsport, located in Victoria is Australia's only authorized Shelby modification shop. The shop has been in business since 1990 importing and converting U.S Fords to right-hand-drive. The shop also stocks and fits high performance Mustang parts. Current Shelby models offered are Shelby Mustang GTs and Super Snakes.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby American has three authorized shops in Canada: Shelby Canada West in Fort Saskatchewan, Dale Adams in Calgary, and Xcentrick Autosports in Ontario, which services eastern Canada.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby Europe was established in 2016 through a partnership with GU Autotrade B.V. in the Netherlands. Shelby trucks are produced by GU Autotrade's manufacturing partner, Magna Steyr, while Shelby Mustangs are produced by another manufacturing partner, TechArt, in Leonberg, Germany.


title: Shelby American

text: In 2019 Shelby American partnered with Matamata Panelworks in the North Island of New Zealand to form Shelby New Zealand. The New Zealand operation offers Shelby trucks, the Shelby GT, the Super Snake and Wide Body Super Snake, with the cars also sold through select Ford dealers. The shop also offers performance upgrades, conversions, merchandise and accessories for existing Mustang owners.


title: Shelby American

text: Links between Shelby and New Zealand date back to the 1960s with renowned fabricator, New Zealander John Ohlsen working with Pete Brock, and Ken Miles on the original Daytona Cobra coupe in 1964. After the Daytona project, Ohlsen became Shelby's chief mechanic for the 1964-1965 race season and stayed with Shelby until 1966. New Zealanders Denny Hulme, Bruce McLaren, and Chris Amon drove for Shelby in the 1966, 34th Grand Prix of Endurance in Le Mans, France. Shelby himself was married (albeit briefly) to a New Zealander, Sue Stafford, in 1963. Shelby employed her father, Arthur Stafford as a race mechanic.


title: Shelby American

text: Shelby South Africa was formed in Malmesbury, Western Cape in 2017 and offers high-end performance packages for the GT and Super Snake platforms. The company also retains distribution rights for the Shelby Cobra, Dayton Cobra Coupe, and Ford GT40.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: Lucky Number Slevin (also known as The Wrong Man in Australia, The 7 Affair in Spain, Hitman for Hire in Mexico and Check-Mate in Brazil) is a 2006 neo-noir action crime thriller film directed by Paul McGuigan and written by Jason Smilovic. The film stars Josh Hartnett, Morgan Freeman, Ben Kingsley, Lucy Liu, Stanley Tucci, and Bruce Willis. It revolves around an innocent man dragged into the middle of a war being plotted by two of New York City's rival crime bosses.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: Two bookies are separately ambushed and murdered by unseen killers. In a bus terminal, a young man is approached by Goodkat, who tells the story of Max and the Kansas City Shuffle: two decades earlier, Max borrowed money from the mob to bet on a fixed horse race, only for the horse to die mid-race. To set an example to make sure nobody else would try to bet on a fixed race, the mob killed Max, his wife and his young son Henry. Goodkat describes the "Kansas City Shuffle", a misleading double bluff, then tricks and kills the young man, taking the body in a truck.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: In New York City, Slevin Kelevra is staying in his friend Nick Fisher's apartment and, upon being visited by Nick's neighbor Lindsey, discusses Nick's disappearance and why his apartment was unlocked. Lindsey suggests that Nick might be missing and, after she leaves, Slevin is kidnapped by two henchmen, who take him to "The Boss". Mistaking Slevin for Nick, The Boss orders him to repay a large gambling debt or kill the son of his rival, "The Rabbi"; The Boss believes The Rabbi is responsible for assassinating his son (seen in the intro), and wants The Rabbi's homosexual son, Yitzchok "The Fairy", to be killed in revenge. Slevin returns to the apartment, but is kidnapped again, this time by two of The Rabbi's Jewish henchmen. Like The Boss, The Rabbi also mistakes Slevin for Nick, and also demands he repay a large gambling debt. Slevin tells The Boss he will kill Yitzchok. Concurrently with Slevin visiting the mob bosses, it becomes apparent Goodkat is somehow involved in both sides and is responsible for Nick's debts being called in, and that he plans to kill Slevin after Yitzchok dies and make it look like they both committed suicide.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: Slevin is approached by Detective Brikowski, who is investigating The Boss and The Rabbi. Brikowski has also been informed that Goodkat is back in town for the first time in twenty years and thinks there is a connection between The Boss, The Rabbi, Goodkat, and Slevin. After pretending to be gay, Slevin gets invited to Yitzchok's apartment, where he and Goodkat kill Yitzchok and his bodyguards. The two then kidnap The Boss and The Rabbi, with both waking up restrained in The Boss's penthouse. Slevin appears and explains the overarching twist: Slevin is Henry, the son of the ill-fated Max, and the mobsters who killed Max were The Boss and The Rabbi. Goodkat is revealed as the assassin hired to kill young Henry, who after an attack of conscience took him in and raised him instead. After revealing his identity, Slevin suffocates The Rabbi and The Boss by taping plastic bags over their heads, killing them the same way they killed his father. Since Lindsey earlier photographed Goodkat while investigating Nick's disappearance, Goodkat shoots her to protect his identity.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: While Brikowski is hunting for Slevin he gets a phone call from his boss and learns the meaning of the pseudonym Slevin Kelevra: "Lucky Number Slevin" was the horse his father had bet on, and "Kelevra" is Hebrew for bad dog, mirroring Goodkat's name. It is revealed that Brikowski murdered Slevin's mother to pay his own gambling debts twenty years ago. As he hears this story Brikowski resigns himself to his fate as Slevin, showing rage for the first time, appears in Brikowski's backseat and shoots him.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: Some time later at the bus terminal Slevin is met by Lindsey, and it is revealed that Goodkat informed Slevin that he had to murder Lindsey because she had a picture of him. However, Slevin explained his true identity to Lindsey and helped fake her death. When Goodkat appears, aware of the deception, Slevin explains he had to save Lindsey and did not think Goodkat would understand. Since Goodkat had saved Slevin as a boy he states that he understands and agrees to leave Lindsey alone. Goodkat gives Slevin back his father's old watch and then disappears into the crowd. The movie flashes back twenty years to when Goodkat first spared young Henry, they drive away and Goodkat turns on the radio to a song titled "Kansas City Shuffle".


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: For its US release on April 7, 2006, it was the first movie from The Weinstein Company to be distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer as part of a three year distribution deal between Weinstein and MGM. The deal was terminated three months early in late 2008.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: The film was released on DVD on September 12, 2006. and on Blu-ray November 8, 2008. To date the film has made $26,877,256 in home video sales, bringing its worldwide total to $83,186,137. This does not include rentals or Blu-ray sales. In addition to Blu-Ray and DVD this was one of the few films to be released on the failed HD-VMD format.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: "Lucky Number Slevin" opened in 1,984 theaters in North America and grossed $7,031,921, with an average of $3,544 per theater and ranking #5 at the box office. The film ultimately earned $22,495,466 domestically and $33,813,415 internationally for a total of $56,308,881, above its $27 million budget.


title: Lucky Number Slevin

text: "Lucky Number Slevin" has received mixed reviews. , the film holds approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on reviews, with an average rating of . The critical consensus states "Trying too hard to be clever in a "Pulp Fiction" kind of way, this film succumbs to a convoluted plot, overly-stylized characters and dizzying set design." The film also has a score of 53 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 36 critics indicating mixed or average reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Merchant navy

text: A merchant navy or merchant marine is the fleet of merchant vessels that are registered in a specific country. On merchant vessels, seafarers of various ranks and sometimes members of are required by the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) to carry Merchant Mariner's Documents.


title: Merchant navy

text: King George V bestowed the title of the "Merchant Navy" on the British merchant shipping fleets following their service in the First World War; since then a number of other nations have also adopted use of that title or the similar "Merchant Marine". The following is a partial list of the merchant navies or merchant marines of various countries. In many countries the fleet's proper name is simply the capitalized version of the common noun ("Merchant Navy").


title: Merchant navy

text: During the First World War, the government requisitioned Australian merchant vessels for use as transport ships, hospital ships and cargo ships. During World War II, they were commissioned for use as hospital ships, supply ships and armed merchant cruisers, in particular in the Pacific campaign. Since 2008, 3 September has been officially commemorated as Merchant Navy Day, on the same day as the pre-existing Australian National Flag Day, which allows the Australian Red Ensign to be flown on land for the occasion as a matter of protocol, as an official recognition of the merchant navy's contribution in wartime. The Australian Merchant Navy Memorial in Canberra, the national capital city of Australia, is a memorial honouring the Australian Merchant Navy's involvement in both world wars.


title: Merchant navy

text: The British Merchant Navy comprises the British merchant ships that transport cargo and people during times of peace and war.


title: Merchant navy

text: For much of its history, the merchant navy was the largest merchant fleet in the world, but with the decline of the British Empire in the mid-20th century it slipped down the rankings. In 1939, the merchant navy was the largest in the world with 33% of total tonnage. By 2012, the merchant navy—still remaining one of the largest in the world—held only 3% of total tonnage. As of the year ending 2012, British Merchant Marine interests consists of 1,504 ships of or over. This includes ships either UK directly owned, parent owned or managed by a British company. This amounts to: or alternatively . This is according to the annual maritime shipping statistics provided by the British government and the Department for Transport. British shipping is represented nationally and globally by the UK Chamber of Shipping.


title: Merchant navy

text: Canada, like several other Commonwealth nations, created its own merchant navy in a large-scale effort in World War II. Established in 1939, the Canadian Merchant Navy played a major role in the Battle of the Atlantic bolstering the Allies' merchant fleet due to high losses in the British Merchant Navy.


title: Merchant navy

text: Eventually thousands of Canadians served in the merchant navy aboard hundreds of Canadian merchant ships, notably the "Park Ship", the Canadian equivalent of the American "Liberty Ship". A school at St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia, trained Canadian merchant mariners. "Manning pools", merchant navy barracks, were built in Canadian ports.


title: Merchant navy

text: The Greek maritime fleet is today engaged in commerce and transportation of goods and services universally. It consists of the merchant vessels owned by Greek civilians, flying either the Greek flag or a flag of convenience.


title: Merchant navy

text: Greece is a maritime nation by tradition, as shipping is arguably the oldest form of occupation of the Greeks and a key element of Greek economic activity since ancient times. In 2015, the Greek Merchant Marine controlled the world's largest merchant fleet in terms of tonnage with a total DWT of 334,649,089 tons and a fleet of 5,226 Greek owned vessels, according to Lloyd's List. Greece is also ranked highly regarding all types of ships, including first for tankers and bulk carriers.


title: Merchant navy

text: The birth of the modern Indian Merchant Navy occurred before independence from the United Kingdom, when in 1919 "SS Loyalty" sailed from India to Britain.


title: Merchant navy

text: Today, India ranks 15th in the world in terms of total DWT. India currently supplies around 12.8% of officers and around 14.5% of ratings to the world seafaring community. This is one of the highest of any country.


title: Merchant navy

text: India has many merchant shipping companies known. Some of them are Shipping Corporation of India, Essar, etc.


title: Merchant navy

text: In December 1939, 3,000 seafarers were employed and 186 merchant vessels were on the New Zealand Registry (many larger New Zealand vessels were however registered in London for insurance purposes). Some foreign vessels were impressed, including the four-masted barque, "Pamir".


title: Merchant navy

text: New Zealand, like several other Commonwealth nations, created a merchant navy. However, the "wartime Merchant Navy was neither a military force nor a single coherent body", instead it was "a diverse collection of private companies and ships".


title: Merchant navy

text: Although some ships were involved in the Atlantic and North Pacific trade, mostly this involved domestic and South Pacific cargos. New Zealand-owned ships were involved in trade with the United Kingdom (84% of all New Zealand exports in 1939) and the majority of New Zealand seamen had served with the British Merchant Navy.


title: Merchant navy

text: Over the course of the war, 64 ships were sunk by enemy action on the New Zealand–UK route, and 140 merchant seafarers lost their lives (a similar number were also taken prisoner).


title: Merchant navy

text: The Pakistan Merchant Navy was formed in 1947. The Ministry of Railways and Communication (Port and Shipping Wing), Mercantile Marine Department and Shipping Office established by the Government of Pakistan. Who were authorized to flag the ships and also ensured that the vessels were sea worthy. All of the private shipping companies merged and formed the National Shipping Corporation (NSC) and the Pakistan Shipping Corporation (PSC) and as a result they had a common flag. Among these companies were the Muhammadi Steamship Company Limited and the East & West Steamship Company.


title: Merchant navy

text: In the Indo-Pak war of 1971 Pakistan suffered a great loss, and most of Pakistani vessels were left in Bangladesh, because of having Bengali speaking crew on them. On 1 January 1974, President of Pakistan Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto nationalized the National Shipping Corporation and Pakistan Shipping Corporation, and formed the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation (PNSC) with the intent of reestablishing the Pakistan Merchant Navy. Later, the company was incorporated under the provisions of the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation Ordinance of 1979 and the Companies Ordinance of 1984.


title: Merchant navy

text: Today, the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation is the national flag carrier. The corporation's head office is located in Karachi. A regional office based in Lahore caters for upcountry shipping requirements. The corporation also has an extensive overseas network of agents looking after its worldwide shipping business. The Pakistan National Shipping Corporation also has several subsidiary companies.


title: Merchant navy

text: The Polish Merchant Navy (, PMH) was created in the interwar period when the Second Polish Republic regained independence. During World War II, many ships of the Polish Navy joined the Allied merchant navy and its convoys as part of the Polish contribution to World War II.


title: Merchant navy

text: After the war, the Polish Merchant Navy was controlled by the People's Republic of Poland and, after 1989, by modern Poland. , the PMH controlled 57 ships (of 1,000 GT or over) totaling / including 50 bulk carriers, two general cargo ships, two chemical tankers, one roll-on/roll-off ship and two short-sea passenger ships.


title: Merchant navy

text: Switzerland, despite being a landlocked country, has a civilian high seas fleet of merchant vessels, whose home port is Basel, on the Rhine. The first ships were purchased and operated by the government in order to ensure the supply of critical resources during World War II. After the war, a privately owned merchant fleet emerged, spurred in part by government subsidies that paid for the fleet's operation up until 1953. As of 2006, 26 ships (mostly container carriers) totalling 479,624 tons, operated by five shipping companies, flew the Swiss flag.


title: Merchant navy

text: The United States Merchant Marine is made up of the nation's civilian-owner merchant ships and government owned ships (Military Sealift Command, NOAA, Army Corps of Engineers, Department of Homeland Security), and the men and women who crew them. The merchant marine transports cargo and passengers during peacetime. In time of war, the merchant marine is an auxiliary to the navy and can be called upon to deliver troops and supplies for the military.


title: Merchant navy

text: The people of the merchant marine are called "merchant mariners", and are civilians except in times of war, when, in accordance with the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, they are considered military personnel. As of 2009, the U.S. merchant fleet numbered 422 ships and approximately 69,000 people.


title: Merchant navy

text: Not included in these numbers are the over 700 ships which are owned by American interests but are registered, or flagged, in other countries.


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: Kathryn Crosby (born Olive Kathryn Grandstaff; November 25, 1933) is a retired American actress and singer who performed in films under the stage names Kathryn Grant and Kathryn Grandstaff.


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: Born Olive Kathryn Grandstaff in West Columbia, Texas, she graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1955. Two years later she became Bing Crosby's second wife, being more than thirty years his junior. The couple had three children, Harry, Mary Frances, and Nathaniel. She appeared as a guest star on her husband's 1964–1965 ABC sitcom "The Bing Crosby Show".


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: Crosby largely retired from acting after her marriage, but did have featured roles as Princess Parisa in "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" (1958), and in the courtroom drama "Anatomy of a Murder" (1959). She also played the part of "Mama Bear" alongside her husband and children in "Goldilocks" and co-starred with Jack Lemmon in the comedy "Operation Mad Ball" (1957), with Tony Curtis in the drama "Mister Cory" (1957) and as a trapeze artist in "The Big Circus" (1959). In the mid-1970s, she hosted "The Kathryn Crosby Show", a 30-minute local talk-show on KPIX-TV in San Francisco. Husband Bing appeared as a guest occasionally. Since Bing Crosby's death in 1977, she has taken on a few smaller roles and the lead in the short-lived 1996 Broadway musical "State Fair".


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: On June 16, 1963, Crosby received her nurse's cap, signifying her becoming a registered nurse after studying at Queen of Angels Hospital in Los Angeles.


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: For 16 years ending in 2001, Crosby hosted the Crosby National Golf Tournament at Bermuda Run Country Club in Bermuda Run, North Carolina. A nearby bridge carrying U.S. Route 158 over the Yadkin River is named for Kathryn Crosby.


title: Kathryn Crosby

text: On November 4, 2010, Crosby was seriously injured in an automobile accident in the Sierra Nevada that killed her 85-year-old second husband, Maurice William Sullivan, whom she had married in 2000.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew Gardens is a botanic garden in southwest London that houses the "largest and most diverse botanical and mycological collections in the world". Founded in 1840, from the exotic garden at Kew Park, its living collections include some of the 27,000 taxa curated by Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, while the herbarium, one of the largest in the world, has over preserved plant and fungal specimens. The library contains more than 750,000 volumes, and the illustrations collection contains more than 175,000 prints and drawings of plants. It is one of London's top tourist attractions and is a World Heritage Site.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew Gardens, together with the botanic gardens at Wakehurst in Sussex, are managed by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, an internationally important botanical research and education institution that employs over 1,100 staff and is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Kew site, which has been dated as formally starting in 1759, although it can be traced back to the exotic garden at Kew Park, formed by Henry, Lord Capell of Tewkesbury, consists of of gardens and botanical glasshouses, four Grade I listed buildings, and 36 Grade II listed structures, all set in an internationally significant landscape. It is listed Grade I on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew consists mostly of the gardens themselves and a small surrounding community. Royal residences in the area which would later influence the layout and construction of the gardens began in 1299 when Edward I moved his court to a manor house in neighbouring Richmond (then called Sheen). That manor house was later abandoned; however, Henry VII built Sheen Palace in 1501, which, under the name Richmond Palace, became a permanent royal residence for Henry VII. Around the start of the 16th century courtiers attending Richmond Palace settled in Kew and built large houses. Early royal residences at Kew included Mary Tudor's house, which was in existence by 1522 when a driveway was built to connect it to the palace at Richmond. Around 1600, the land that would become the gardens was known as Kew Field, a large field strip farmed by one of the new private estates.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The exotic garden at Kew Park, formed by Henry Capell, 1st Baron Capell of Tewkesbury, was enlarged and extended by Augusta, Dowager Princess of Wales, the widow of Frederick, Prince of Wales. The origins of Kew Gardens can be traced to the merging of the royal estates of Richmond and Kew in 1772. William Chambers built several garden structures, including the lofty Great Pagoda built in 1761 which still remains. George III enriched the gardens, aided by William Aiton and Sir Joseph Banks. The old Kew Park (by then renamed the White House), was demolished in 1802. The "Dutch House" adjoining was purchased by George III in 1781 as a nursery for the royal children. It is a plain brick structure now known as Kew Palace.


title: Kew Gardens

text: "The Epicure's Almanack" reports an anecdote of the garden wall as of 1815: "In going up Dreary Lane that leads to Richmond you pass along the east boundary wall of Kew Gardens, extending more than a mile in length. This dead wall used to have a most teasing and tedious effect on the eye of a pedestrian; but a poor mendicant crippled seaman, some years ago, enlivened it by drawing on it, in chalk, every man of war in the British navy. He returns annually to the spot to refit his ships, and raises considerable supplies for his own victualling board from the gratuities of the charitable, who pass to and from Richmond."


title: Kew Gardens

text: Some early plants came from the walled garden established by William Coys at Stubbers in North Ockendon. The collections grew somewhat haphazardly until the appointment of the first collector, Francis Masson, in 1771. Capability Brown, who became England's most renowned landscape architect, applied for the position of master gardener at Kew, and was rejected.


title: Kew Gardens

text: In 1840, the gardens were adopted as a national botanical garden, in large part due to the efforts of the Royal Horticultural Society and its president William Cavendish. Under Kew's director, William Hooker, the gardens were increased to 30 hectares (75 acres) and the pleasure grounds, or arboretum, extended to , and later to its present size of . The first curator was John Smith.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Palm House was built by architect Decimus Burton and iron-maker Richard Turner between 1844 and 1848, and was the first large-scale structural use of wrought iron. It is considered "the world's most important surviving Victorian glass and iron structure". The structure's panes of glass are all hand-blown. The Temperate House, which is twice as large as the Palm House, followed later in the 19th century. It is now the largest Victorian glasshouse in existence. Kew was the location of the successful effort in the 19th century to propagate rubber trees for cultivation outside South America.


title: Kew Gardens

text: In February 1913, the Tea House was burned down by suffragettes Olive Wharry and Lilian Lenton during a series of arson attacks in London.


title: Kew Gardens

text: From 1959 to 2007, Kew Gardens had the tallest flagpole in Britain. Made from a single Douglas-fir from Canada, it was given to mark both the centenary of the Canadian Province of British Columbia and the bicentenary of Kew Gardens. The flagpole was removed after damage by weather and woodpeckers made it a danger.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Five trees survive from the establishment of the botanical gardens in 1762. Together they are known as the 'Five Lions' and consist of: a ginkgo ("Ginkgo biloba"), a pagoda tree, or scholar tree ("Styphnolobium japonicum"), an oriental plane ("Platanus orientalis"), a black locust, or false acacia ("Robinia pseudoacacia"), and a Caucasian elm or zelkova ("Zelkova carpinifolia").


title: Kew Gardens

text: A canopy walkway, which opened in 2008, takes visitors on a walk above the ground, in the tree canopy of a woodland glade. Visitors can ascend and descend by stairs and by a lift. The walkway floor is perforated metal and flexes under foot; the entire structure sways in the wind. It was designed by David Marks.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The accompanying photograph shows a section of the walkway, including the steel supports, which were designed to rust to a tree-like appearance to help the walkway fit in visually with its surroundings.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Lake Crossing bridge, made of granite and bronze, opened in May 2006. Designed by Buro Happold and John Pawson, it crosses the lake and was previously named in honor of Dr Mortimer and Theresa Sackler.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The minimalist-styled bridge is designed as a sweeping double curve of black granite. The sides of the bridge are formed of bronze posts that give the impression, from certain angles, of forming a solid wall while, from others, and to those on the bridge, they are clearly individual entities that allow a view of the water beyond.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The bridge forms part of a path designed to encourage visitors to visit more of the gardens than had hitherto been popular and connects the two art galleries, via the Temperate and Evolution Houses and the woodland glade, to the Minka House and the Bamboo Garden.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Hive opened in 2016 and is a multi-sensory experience designed to highlight the extraordinary life of bees. It stands 17 metres (56 ft) tall and is set in a wildflower meadow. The Hive was designed by English artist Wolfgang Buttress. The Hive has been created using thousands of aluminium pieces that are presented in the shape of a honeycomb. It was initially installed as a temporary exhibition, but was given a permanent home at Kew Gardens due to its popularity.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew Explorer is a service that takes a circular route around the gardens, provided by two 72-seater road trains that are fuelled by Calor Gas to minimize pollution. A commentary is provided by the driver and there are several stops.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew has one of the largest compost heaps in Europe, made from green and woody waste from the gardens and the manure from the stables of the Household Cavalry. The compost is mainly used in the gardens, but on occasion has been auctioned as part of a fundraising event for the gardens.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The compost heap is in an area of the gardens not accessible to the public, but a viewing platform, made of wood which had been illegally traded but seized by Customs officers in HMRC, has been erected to allow visitors to observe the heap as it goes through its cycle.


title: Kew Gardens

text: In March 2006, the Davies Alpine House opened, the third version of an alpine house since 1887. Although only long the apex of the roof arch extends to a height of in order to allow the natural airflow of a building of this shape to aid in the all-important ventilation required for the type of plants to be housed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The new house features a set of automatically operated blinds that prevent it from overheating when the sun is too hot for the plants together with a system that blows a continuous stream of cool air over the plants. The main design aim of the house is to allow maximum light transmission. To this end the glass is of a special low iron type that allows 90 percent of the ultraviolet light in sunlight to pass. It is attached by high tension steel cables so that no light is obstructed by traditional glazing bars.


title: Kew Gardens

text: To conserve energy the cooling air is not refrigerated but is cooled by being passed through a labyrinth of pipes buried under the house at a depth where the temperature remains suitable all year round. The house is designed so that the maximum temperature should not exceed .


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew's collection of Alpine plants (defined as those that grow above the tree line in their locale – ground level at the poles rising to over ), extends to over 7000. As the Alpine House can only house around 200 at a time the ones on show are regularly rotated.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Originally designed for Buckingham Palace, this was moved to Kew in 1836 by King William IV. The building was formerly known as the Aroid House No. 1 and was used to display species of Araceae, the building was listed Grade II* in 1950. With an abundance of natural light, the building is now used for various exhibitions, weddings, and private events. It is also now used to exhibit the winners of the photography competition.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Orangery was designed by Sir William Chambers, and was completed in 1761. It measures . It was found to be too dark for its intended purpose of growing citrus plants and they were moved out in 1841. After many changes of use, it is currently used as a restaurant.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Palm House (1844–1848) was the result of cooperation between architect Decimus Burton and iron founder Richard Turner, and continues upon the glass house design principles developed by John Claudius Loudon and Joseph Paxton. A space frame of wrought iron arches, held together by horizontal tubular structures containing long prestressed cables, supports glass panes which were originally tinted green with copper oxide to reduce the significant heating effect. The high central nave is surrounded by a walkway at height, allowing visitors a closer look upon the palm tree crowns. In front of the Palm House on the east side are the Queen's Beasts, ten statues of animals bearing shields. They are Portland stone replicas of originals done by James Woodford and were placed here in 1958.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Palm House was originally heated by two coal-fired boilers, with a chimney, the "Shaft of the Great Palm-Stove", now known as the Campanile, near the Victoria Gate. Coal was brought in by a light railway, running in a tunnel, using human-propelled wagons. The tunnel acted as a flue between the boilers and the chimney, but the distance proved too great for efficient working, and so two small chimneys were added to the Palm House. In 1950 the railway was electrified. The tunnel is now used to carry piped hot water to the Palm House, from oil-fired boilers located near the original chimney, which is extant, and is Grade II listed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew's third major conservatory, the Princess of Wales Conservatory, designed by architect Gordon Wilson, was opened in 1987 by Diana, Princess of Wales in commemoration of her predecessor Augusta's associations with Kew. It replaced 26 smaller buildings. In 1989 the conservatory received the Europa Nostra award for conservation. The conservatory houses ten computer-controlled micro-climatic zones, with the bulk of the greenhouse volume composed of Dry Tropics and Wet Tropics plants. Significant numbers of orchids, water lilies, cacti, lithops, carnivorous plants and bromeliads are housed in the various zones. The cactus collection also extends outside the conservatory where some hardier species can be found.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The conservatory has an area of . As it is designed to minimize the amount of energy taken to run it, the cooler zones are grouped around the outside and the more tropical zones are in the central area where heat is conserved. The glass roof extends down to the ground, giving the conservatory a distinctive appearance and helping to maximize the use of the sun's energy.


title: Kew Gardens

text: During the construction of the conservatory a time capsule was buried. It contains the seeds of basic crops and endangered plant species and key publications on conservation.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Temperate House, re-opened in May 2018 after being closed for restoration, is a greenhouse that has twice the floor area of the Palm House and is the world's largest surviving Victorian glass structure. It contains plants and trees from all the temperate regions of the world, some of which are extremely rare. It was commissioned in 1859 and designed by architect Decimus Burton and iron founder Richard Turner. Covering 4880 square metres, it rises to a height of . Intended to accommodate Kew's expanding collection of hardy and temperate plants, it took 40 years to construct, during which time costs soared. The building was closed for restoration 1980–82. The building was restored during 2014–15 by Donald Insall Associates, based on their conservation management plan.


title: Kew Gardens

text: There is a viewing gallery in the central section from which visitors can look down on that part of the collection.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Waterlily House is the hottest and most humid of the houses at Kew and contains a large pond with varieties of water lily, surrounded by a display of economically important heat-loving plants. It closes during the winter months.


title: Kew Gardens

text: It was built to house "Victoria amazonica", the largest of the water lily family Nymphaeaceae. This plant was originally transported to Kew in vials of clean water and arrived in February 1849, after several prior attempts to transport seeds and roots had failed. Although various other members of Nymphaeaceae grew well, the house did not suit the "Victoria", purportedly because of a poor ventilation system, and this specimen was moved to another, smaller, house (Victoria amazonica House No. 10).


title: Kew Gardens

text: The ironwork for the Waterlily House project was provided by Richard Turner and the initial construction was completed in 1852. The heat for the house was initially obtained by running a flue from the nearby Palm House but it was later equipped with its own boiler.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Formerly known as the Australian House. The house was a gift from the Australian Government. It was designed by S L Rothwell (Ministry of Works) with consultant engineer J E Temple and was constructed by the Crittall Manufacturing Company Ltd. It opened in 1952. From 1995 it was known as the Evolution House. The building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 for its special architectural or historic interest.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Bonsai House was formerly known as the Alpine House No. 24 prior to the construction of the Davies Alpine House.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The extant Aroid House (now the Nash Conservatory) was designated Plant House No. 1 and the Water Lily House was Plant House No. 15.


title: Kew Gardens

text: In the southeast corner of Kew Gardens stands the Great Pagoda (by Sir William Chambers), erected in 1762, from a design in imitation of the Chinese "Ta". The lowest of the ten octagonal storeys is in diameter. From the base to the highest point is .


title: Kew Gardens

text: Each storey finishes with a projecting roof, after the Chinese manner, originally covered with ceramic tiles and adorned with large dragons; a tale is still propagated that they were made of gold and were reputedly sold by George IV to settle his debts. In fact the dragons were made of wood painted gold, and simply rotted away with the ravages of time. The walls of the building are composed of brick. The staircase, 253 steps, is in the center of the building. During the Second World War holes were cut in each floor to allow for drop-testing of model bombs.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Pagoda was closed to the public for many years but was reopened for the summer months of 2006. It has been renovated in a major restoration project and reopened under the aegis of Historic Royal Palaces in 2018. 80 dragons have been remade and now sit on each storey of the building.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Built for the Japan-British Exhibition (1910) and moved to Kew in 1911, the Chokushi-Mon ("Imperial Envoy's Gateway") is a four-fifths scale replica of the karamon (gateway) of the Nishi Hongan-ji temple in Kyoto. It lies about north of the Pagoda and is surrounded by a reconstruction of a traditional Japanese garden.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Following the Japan 2001 festival, Kew acquired a Japanese wooden house called a minka. It was originally erected in around 1900 in a suburb of Okazaki and is now located within the bamboo collection in the west-central part of Kew Gardens. Japanese craftsmen reassembled the framework and British builders who had worked on the Globe Theatre added the mud wall panels.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Work on the house started on 7 May 2001 and, when the framework was completed on , a Japanese ceremony was held to mark what was considered an auspicious occasion. Work on the building of the house was completed in November 2001 but the internal artifacts were not all in place until 2006.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Within the conservation area is a cottage that was built sometime before 1771 for Queen Charlotte by her husband George III. It has been restored by Historic Royal Palaces and is separately administered by them. It is open to the public on weekends and bank holidays during the summer.


title: Kew Gardens

text: A double porticoed Doric temple in stone with a series of cast-iron panels set in the inside walls commemorating British military victories from Minden (1759) to Waterloo (1815). It was built in 1837 by Sir Jeffery Wyatville, and originally called The Pantheon. Named after King William IV (1830–37). It is Grade II listed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: A domed rotunda with eight Tuscan columns. The original temple was built in 1763 by Sir William Chambers. The present temple is an 1845 replacement by Decimus Burton. It is Grade II listed. The temple was one of three originally named to honour British victories in the Seven Years' War, in this case the name commemorates HMS Aeolus.


title: Kew Gardens

text: A small Greek temple portico with two Ionic columns and two outer Ionic pillars; it is pedimented with a cornice and key pattern frieze. It was built in 1758 by Sir William Chambers. It is Grade II listed. Similar to the temple of Aeolus and Bellona, she was later named to commemorate the warship HMS Arethusa.


title: Kew Gardens

text: A whitewashed stucco temple. The facade has a portico of two pairs of Doric columns with a metope frieze pediment and an oval dome behind. Inside is a room with an oval domed center. On the walls garlands and medallions with the names and numbers of British and Hanovarian units connected with the Seven Years' War. It was built in 1760 by Sir William Chambers and eventually named after HMS Bellona. It is Grade II listed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: A brick arch with rustication in stucco. A triple-arched opening with oculi above lower side arches, it has a stone band course and a fragmented blocked cornice and brick offering, and a corniced doorway. It was built in 1759–60 by Sir William Chambers. It is Grade II* listed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Ice House is believed to be early 18th-century, it has a brick dome with an access arch and barrel-vaulted passageway, covered by a mound of earth. It is Grade II listed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew Palace is the smallest of the British royal palaces. It was built by Samuel Fortrey, a Dutch merchant in around 1631. It was later purchased by George III. The construction method is known as Flemish bond and involves laying the bricks with long and short sides alternating. This and the gabled front give the construction a Dutch appearance.


title: Kew Gardens

text: To the rear of the building is the "Queen's Garden" which includes a collection of plants believed to have medicinal qualities. Only plants that were extant in England by the 17th century are grown in the garden.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The building underwent significant restoration, with leading conservation architects Donald Insall Associates, before being reopened to the public in 2006. It is administered separately from Kew Gardens, by Historic Royal Palaces.


title: Kew Gardens

text: In front of the palace is a sundial, which was given to Kew Gardens in 1959 to commemorate a royal visit. It was sculpted by Martin Holden and is a replica of one by Thomas Tompion, a celebrated 17th-century clockmaker, which had been sited near the surviving palace building since 1832 to mark the site of James Bradley's observations leading to his discovery of the aberration of light.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Admission to the galleries and museum is free after paying admission to the gardens. The International Garden Photographer of the Year Exhibition is an annual event with an indoor display of entries during the summer months.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanic Art opened in April 2008, and holds paintings from Kew's and Dr Shirley Sherwood's collections, many of which had never been displayed to the public before. It features paintings by artists such as Georg D. Ehret, the Bauer brothers, Pierre-Joseph Redouté and Walter Hood Fitch. The paintings and drawings are cycled on a six-monthly basis. The gallery is linked to the Marianne North Gallery (see below).


title: Kew Gardens

text: Near the Palm House is a building known as the General Museum or "Museum No. 1" (even though it is now the only museum on the site), which was designed by Decimus Burton and opened in 1857. Housing Kew's economic botany collections including tools, ornaments, clothing, food and medicines, its aim was to illustrate human dependence on plants. The building was refurbished in 1998. The upper two floors are now an education center and the ground floor houses The Botanical restaurant. Due to its historical holdings, Kew is a member of The London Museums of Health & Medicine group.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Marianne North Gallery was built in the 1880s to house the paintings of Marianne North, an MP's daughter who travelled alone to North and South America, South Africa, and many parts of Asia, at a time when women rarely did so, to paint plants. The gallery has 832 of her paintings. She left the paintings to Kew on condition that the layout of the paintings in the gallery would not be altered.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The gallery had suffered considerable structural degradation since its creation and during a period from 2008 to 2009 major restoration and refurbishment took place, with works led by leading conservation architects Donald Insall Associates. During the time the gallery was closed the opportunity was also taken to restore the paintings to their original condition. The gallery reopened in October 2009.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The gallery originally opened in 1882 and is still the only permanent exhibition in Great Britain dedicated to the work of one woman.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Cambridge Cottage is a former residence of the Duke of Cambridge (1819–1904). It became part of the Gardens in 1904, and was opened in 1910 as the Museum of British Forestry or Museum No. 4. After 1958 it was known as the Wood Museum and displayed samples of wood from around the world. It is Grade II listed. Today it is a meeting and function venue.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The living plant collections include the Alpine and Rock Garden, Aquatic, Arboretum, Arid, Aroid, Bonsai, Bromeliad, Carnivorous Plant, Cycad, Fern, Grass, Island Flora, Mediterranean Garden, Orchid, Palm, Temperate Herbaceous, Tender Temperate, Tropical Herbaceous, and Tropical Woody and Climbers Collections.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Aquatic Garden is near the Jodrell laboratory. The Aquatic Garden, which celebrated its centenary in 2009, provides conditions for aquatic and marginal plants. The large central pool holds a selection of summer-flowering water lilies and the corner pools contain plants such as reed mace, bulrushes, Phragmites and smaller floating aquatic species.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Arid Collection (including Cactaceae and many other succulent plants) is housed in the Tropical Nursery, the Princess of Wales Conservatory and the Temperate House.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Grass Garden was created on its current site in the early 1980s to display ornamental and economic grasses; it was redesigned and replanted between 1994 and 1997. Over 580 species of grasses are displayed.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Orchid Collection is housed in two climate zones within the Princess of Wales Conservatory. To maintain an interesting display the plants are changed regularly so that those on view are generally flowering. The Rock Garden, originally built of limestone in 1882, is now constructed of Sussex sandstone from West Hoathly, Sussex. The rock garden is divided into six geographic regions: Europe, Mediterranean and Africa, Australia and New Zealand, Asia, North America, and South America. There are currently 2,480 different "accessions" growing in the garden.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Arboretum, which covers the southern two-thirds of the site, contains over 14,000 trees of many thousands of varieties.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Kew Herbarium is one of the largest in the world with approximately specimens used primarily for taxonomic study. The herbarium is rich in types for all regions of the world, especially the tropics, and is currently growing with 30,000 new specimen additions annually through international collaborations. The Kew Herbarium is of global importance, attracting researchers from and supporting and engaging in the science of botany all over the world, especially the field of biodiversity. A large part of the herbarium has been digitised, and is available to the general public on-line. The "Index Herbariorum" code assigned to the Kew herbarium is K and it is used when citing housed specimens.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew Gardens holds further collections of scientific importance including a Fungarium (for fungi), a plant DNA bank and a seed bank. The Kew Fungarium houses approximately 1.25 million specimens of dried fungi.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Library, Art & Archives at Kew are one of the world's largest botanical collections, with over half a million items, including books, botanical illustrations, photographs, letters and manuscripts, periodicals, and maps. The Archives, Illustrations, Rare Book collections, Main Library, and Economic Botany Library are housed within the Herbarium building.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Owing to an agreement signed in 1962, the scope of the collection generally does not overlap that of the Natural History Museum in London, which concerns itself with the flora of Europe and North America.


title: Kew Gardens

text: Kew provides advice and guidance to police forces around the world where plant material may provide important clues or evidence in cases. In one famous case, the forensic science department at Kew was able to ascertain that the contents of the stomach of a headless corpse found in the river Thames contained a highly toxic African bean.


title: Kew Gardens

text: The Sustainable Uses of Plants Group (formerly the Centre for Economic Botany), focuses on the uses of plants in the United Kingdom and the world's arid and semi-arid zones. The center is also responsible for the curation of the Economic Botany Collection, which contains more than 90,000 botanical raw materials and ethnographic artifacts, some of which are on display in the Plants + People exhibit in Museum No. 1. The centre is now located in the Jodrell Laboratory.