title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: After Nazi Germany declared war on the Soviet Union in 1941, the Soviet Union initiated another major round of ethnic deportations. The first group targeted were Soviet Germans. Between September 1941 and February 1942, 900,000 people, over 70 per cent of the entire Soviet German community, were deported to Kazakhstan and Siberia in mass operations. A second wave of mass deportations took place between November 1943 and May 1944, in which Soviet authorities expelled six ethnic groups, such as the Balkars, Chechens, Crimean Tatars, Ingush, Karachai, and Kalmyks, that together numbered 900,000. There were also smaller-scale operations involving ethnic cleansing of diaspora minorities during and after World War II, in which tens of thousands of Crimean Bulgarians, Greeks, Iranians, Khemshils, Kurds, and Meskhetian Turks were deported from the Black Sea and Transcaucasian border regions.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Two ethnic groups specifically targeted for persecution by Stalin's Soviet Union were the Chechens and the Ingush. Unlike the other nationalities suspected of connection to foreign states that shared their ethnic background, the Chechens and the Ingush were completely indigenous people of the Soviet Union. Rather than being accused of collaboration with foreign enemies, these two ethnic groups were considered to have cultures that did not fit in with Soviet culture, such as accusing Chechens of being associated with "banditism", and the authorities claimed that the Soviet Union had to intervene in order to "remake" and "reform" these cultures. In practice, this meant heavily armed punitive operations against Chechen "bandits" that failed to achieve forced assimilation, culminating in an ethnic cleansing operation in 1944, which involved the arrests and deportation of over 500,000 Chechens and Ingush from the Caucasus to Central Asia and Kazakhstan. The deportations of the Chechens and Ingush also involved the outright massacre of thousands of people and severe conditions placed upon the deportees; they were put in unsealed train cars, with little to no food for a four-week journey during which many died from hunger and exhaustion. The main difference between Nazi and Stalinist deportations was in their purpose. While Nazi Germany sought ethnic cleansing to allow settlement by Germans into the cleansed territory, Stalin's Soviet Union pursued ethnic cleansing to remove minorities from strategically important areas.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: In 1952, British historian Alan Bullock wrote the first comprehensive biography of Hitler, which dominated Hitler scholarship for many years. His "" showed him as an opportunistic "Machtpolitiker" ("power politician") devoid of principles, beliefs, or scruples, whose actions throughout his career were motivated only by a lust for power. Bullock's views led in the 1950s to a debate with Hugh Trevor-Roper, who posited that Hitler possessed beliefs, albeit repulsive ones, and that his actions were motivated by them. In 1991, Bullock published "", in which he showed how the careers of Hitler and Stalin, whose "personal malice marked him out from Hitler, who was astonishingly tolerant of inadequate colleagues", fed off each other to some extent. Despite friends fearing it would flop and others who doubted the two lives were parallel in any meaningful sense, the book was a success, and Bullock came to the thesis that Stalin's ability to consolidate power in his home country and not to over-extend himself enabled him to retain power longer than Hitler, whom Bullock favoured to spend a weekend with, as part of a frivolous question, because "although it would have been boring in the extreme, you would have had a greater certainty in coming back alive." American historian Ronald Spector praised Bullock's ability to write about the development of Nazism and Stalinism without either abstract generalization or irrelevant detail. Israeli academic Amikam Nachmani wrote that Bullock's Hitler and Stalin "come out as two blood-thirsty, pathologically evil, sanguine tyrants, who are sure of the presence of determinism, hence having unshakeable beliefs that Destiny assigned on them historical missions—the one to pursue a social industrialized revolution in the Soviet Union, the other to turn Germany into a global empire."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: In his work on fascism, American historian Stanley G. Payne said that although the Nazi Party was ideologically opposed to communism, Hitler and other Nazi leaders frequently expressed recognition that only in the Soviet Union were their revolutionary and ideological counterparts to be found. Both placed a major emphasis on creating a "party-army", with the regular armed forces controlled by the party. In the case of the Soviet Union, this was done through the political commissars, while Nazi Germany introduced a roughly equivalent leadership role for "National Socialist Guidance Officers" in 1943. In his work on Stalinism, French historian François Furet commented that despite ideological differences, Hitler personally admired Stalin and his politics and believed that Stalin was in effect transforming Soviet Bolshevism into a form of Nazism. On numerous occasions, Hitler publicly praised Stalin for seeking to purify the Soviet Communist party of Jewish influences, especially by purging Jewish communists, such as Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev, and Karl Radek. American academic Richard Pipes drew attention to Stalin and antisemitism in a parallel with Nazi antisemitism. He states that soon after the 1917 October Revolution, the Soviet Union undertook practices to break up Jewish culture, religion, and language. In the fall of 1918, the Soviet communist party set up the Jewish section Yevsektsiya, with a stated mission of "destruction of traditional Jewish life, the Zionist movement, and Hebrew culture." By 1919, the Bolsheviks confiscated Jewish properties, Hebrew schools, libraries, books, and synagogues under newly imposed anti-religious laws, turning their buildings into "Communist centers, clubs or restaurants." After Stalin rose to power, antisemitism continued to be endemic throughout Russia, although official Soviet policy condemned it.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Political scientist Michael Parenti stated that many of the narratives which equate Nazism, or fascism more generally, and Stalinism, or communism more generally, are often simplistic and usually omit the class interests of each respective movement. Parenti says that the fascists in Germany and Italy, despite "some meager social programs" and public works projects designed to bolster nationalist sentiment, supported and served the interests of big business and the capitalist class at the expense of the workers by outlawing strikes and unions, privatizing state-owned mills, plants and banks along with farm cooperatives, abolishing workplace safety regulations, minimum wage laws and overtime pay, and subsidizing heavy industry. This resulted in the fascists having many admirers and supporters among the capitalist class in their nations and the West, including the United States. By contrast, while stating there were deficiencies in Marxist–Leninist states, some of which he attributes to maldevelopment due to outside pressure from a hostile capitalist world, and acknowledging the numerous state-sanctioned imprisonments and killings, which he says were exaggerated for political reasons, Parenti asserts that the Stalinist regime in particular "made dramatic gains in literacy, industrial wages, health care and women's rights", and communist revolutions in general "created a life for the mass of people that was far better than the wretched existence they had endured under feudal lords, military bosses, foreign colonizers and Western capitalists."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Jacques Sémelin writes that Stéphane Courtois and Jean-Louis Margolin "view class genocide as the equivalent to racial genocide." Alongside Michael Mann, they contributed to "the debates on comparisons between Nazism and communism", with Sémelin describing this as a theory also developed in "The Black Book of Communism". According to historian Andrzej Paczkowski, only Courtois made the comparison between Communism and Nazism. Meanwhile the other sections of the book "are, in effect, narrowly focused monographs, which do not pretend to offer overarching explanations." Paczkowski wonders whether it can be applied "the same standard of judgment to, on the one hand, an ideology that was destructive at its core, that openly planned genocide, and that had an agenda of aggression against all neighboring (and not just neighboring) states, and, on the other hand, an ideology that seemed clearly the opposite, that was based on the secular desire of humanity to achieve equality and social justice, and that promised a great leap of forward into freedom", and stated that while a good question, it is hardly new and inappropriate because "The Black Book of Communism" is not "about communism as an ideology or even about communism as a state-building phenomenon."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: In comparing the deaths caused by both Stalin and Hitler's policies, historians have asserted that archival evidence released after the dissolution of the Soviet Union confirms that Stalin did not kill more people than Hitler. In 2011, American historian Timothy D. Snyder said the Nazi regime killed about 11 million non-combatants (which rises to above 12 million if "foreseeable deaths from deportation, hunger, and sentences in concentration camps are included"), with comparable figures for Stalin's regime being roughly 6 and 9 million. Australian historian and archival researcher Stephen G. Wheatcroft posited that "[t]he Stalinist regime was consequently responsible for about a million purposive killings, and through its criminal neglect and irresponsibility it was probably responsible for the premature deaths of about another two million more victims amongst the repressed population, i.e. in the camps, colonies, prisons, exile, in transit and in the POW camps for Germans. These are clearly much lower figures than those for whom Hitler's regime was responsible." According to Wheatcroft, unlike Hitler, Stalin's "purposive killings" fit more closely into the category of "execution" than "murder", given he thought the accused were indeed guilty of crimes against the state and insisted on documentation. In contrast, Hitler wanted to kill Jews and communists because of who they were, insisted on no documentation, and was indifferent at even a pretence of legality for these actions.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: According to historian Thomas Kühne, going back to the "Historikerstreit", conservative intellectuals such as Ernst Nolte and the Holocaust uniqueness debate, the attempts to link Soviet and Nazi crimes, citing books such as Snyder's "Bloodlands" as prominent examples, are "as politically tricky today as it was then. As it seems to reduce the responsibility of the Nazis and their collaborators, supporters and claqueurs, it is welcomed in rightist circles of various types: German conservatives in the 1980s, who wanted to 'normalise' the German past, and East European and ultranationalists today, who downplay Nazi crimes and up-play Communist crimes in order to promote a common European memory that merges Nazism and Stalinism into a 'double-genocide' theory that prioritises East European suffering over Jewish suffering, obfuscates the distinction between perpetrators and victims, and provides relief from the bitter legacy of East Europeans' collaboration in the Nazi genocide."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Kristen Ghodsee, an ethnographer of post-Cold War Eastern Europe, contends that the efforts to institutionalize the "double genocide thesis", or the moral equivalence between the Nazi Holocaust (race murder) and the victims of communism (class murder), and in particular, the recent push at the beginning of the global financial crisis for the commemoration of the latter in Europe, can be seen as the response by economic and political elites to fears of a leftist resurgence in the face of devastated economies and extreme inequalities in both the East and West as the result of neoliberal capitalism. She states that any discussion of the achievements under communism, including literacy, education, women's rights, and social security, is usually silenced. Any discourse on the subject of communism is focused almost exclusively on Stalin's crimes and the "double genocide thesis", an intellectual paradigm summed up as such: "1) any move towards redistribution and away from a completely free market is seen as communist; 2) anything communist inevitably leads to class murder; and 3) class murder is the moral equivalent of the Holocaust." By linking all leftist and socialist ideals to the excesses of Stalinism, Ghodsee says that the elites in the West hope to discredit and marginalize all political ideologies that could "threaten the primacy of private property and free markets."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Historian Nicholas Doumanis states that the totalitarian perspective of equating Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union under Stalin is not conceivable and is a misunderstanding of the two distinct natures of the regimes, which is why they were enemies. Stalin's main goal was to create a socialist state, under the banner of socialism in one country, that was autarkic, industrialized, and multiethnic. Genocide was not in Stalin's plans, rather nationalism and nation-building were, and it was not inherent in the building of a non-capitalist, non-expansionary state. Political scientist Laure Neumayer states that "The Black Book of Communism" contributed greatly to legitimizing "the equivalence of Nazi and Communist crimes" by "making criminality the very essence of communism." Neumayer writes that the book "figures prominently in the 'spaces of the anti-communist cause' comparably structured in the former satellite countries", which are "a major source of the discourse" criminalizing the Communist period.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Some research institutions are focusing on the analysis of fascism/Nazism and Stalinism/Communist states, and the comparative approach, including the Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies in Germany, the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes in the Czech Republic, and the Institute of National Remembrance in Poland. Nonetheless, the comparison of Nazism and Stalinism remains a neglected field of academic study.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: In the 1920s, the social fascism theory advanced by the Soviet government and the Comintern, including the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) during the Third Period, accused social democracy of enabling fascism and went as far as to call social democrats "social fascists." The Social Democratic Party of Germany, under the leadership of Chancellor Hermann Müller, adopted the view that the communists and Nazis posed an equal danger to liberal democracy. In 1930, Kurt Schumacher said that the two movements enabled each other. He posited that the KPD, which was staunchly Stalinist, were "red-painted Nazis." After being opponents for most of the 1930s, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939. In September 1939, "The New York Times" published an editorial arguing that "Hitlerism is brown communism, Stalinism is red fascism...The world will now understand that the only real 'ideological' issue is one between democracy, liberty and peace on the one hand and despotism, terror and war on the other." During the period while the pact was in force, Mussolini positively reviewed Stalinism and believed that Stalin was in effect transforming Soviet Bolshevism into a Slavic fascism. The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany remained aligned for the first two years of World War II, until Hitler broke the pact by invading the USSR in 1941. Prior to this, the signing of the 1933 Treaty of Friendship, Nonaggression, and Neutrality had Fascist Italy become a major trading partner with Joseph Stalin's USSR, exchanging Soviet natural resources for Italian technical assistance, which included the fields of aviation, automobile and naval technology.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: Marxist theories of fascism have seen fascism as a form of reaction to socialism and a feature of capitalism. Several modern historians have tried to pay more attention to the economic, political and ideological differences between these two regimes than their similarities.


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: The 2008 documentary film "The Soviet Story", commissioned by the Union for Europe of the Nations group in the European Parliament and produced and directed by Latvian filmmaker Edvīns Šnore, compared the atrocities of the two regimes in a reminiscence of the "Historikerstreit" in the 1980s. In the documentary, Šnore stated that "not only were the crimes of the former inspired by the crimes of the latter, but that they helped each other, and that without their mutual assistance the outcome of World War II could have been quite different." While in Latvia, the term "genocide" is widely used to also refer to forced population transfer in the Soviet Union, for example, in the Commemoration Day for the Victims of Communist Genocide. This classification as "genocide" is still being debated in the academic literature. The Eastern European approaches of history have been incorporated in the European Union agenda, among them the Prague Declaration and the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, proclaimed by the European Parliament in August 2008 and endorsed by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in July 2009; it is officially known as the Black Ribbon Day in some countries, including Canada. Among many scholars in Western Europe, the comparison of the two totalitarian regimes and the equation of their crimes is widely rejected. According to Mārtiņš Kaprāns, a communication science expert and researcher at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, University of Latvia, "[s]cholars have argued that "The Soviet Story" is an effective Latvian response to Russian propaganda, but it also exemplifies the broader problems of post-communist memory politics." In his memory studies article, Kaprāns wrote that "the idea of how memory work triggered by the documentary got started on social networking sites" and on "the video-sharing website YouTube and the Internet encyclopedia Wikipedia, both of which are crucial meaning-making sites with respect to history."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: The 2008 Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism, initiated by the Czech government and signed by figures such as Václav Havel, called for "a common approach regarding crimes of totalitarian regimes, inter alia Communist regimes." It also called for "[r]eaching an all-European understanding that both the Nazi and Communist totalitarian regimes each to be judged by their own terrible merits to be destructive in their policies of systematically applying extreme forms of terror, suppressing all civic and human liberties, starting aggressive wars and, as an inseparable part of their ideologies, exterminating and deporting whole nations and groups of population; and that as such they should be considered to be the main disasters, which blighted the 20th century." In 2009, Hans-Gert Pöttering, former President of the European Parliament and Christian Democratic Union member, stated that "both totalitarian systems (Stalinism and Nazism) are comparable and terrible." The Communist Party of Greece opposed the Prague Declaration and criticized "the new escalation of the anti-communist hysteria led by the EU council, the European Commission and the political staff of the bourgeois class in the European Parliament." The Communist Party of Britain opined that the Prague Declaration "is a rehash of the persistent attempts by reactionary historians to equate Soviet Communism and Hitlerite Fascism, echoing the old slanders of British authors George Orwell and Robert Conquest."


title: Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism

text: In some Eastern European countries, the denial of both Communist and Nazi crimes has been explicitly outlawed, such as in the Polish legal system and the Polish Penal Code, and Czech foreign minister Karel Schwarzenberg said that "there is a fundamental concern here that totalitarian systems be measured by the same standard." In 2010, the European Commission rejected calls for similar EU-wide legislation due to the lack of consensus among member states. A statement adopted by Russia's legislature said that comparisons of Nazism and Stalinism are "blasphemous towards all of the anti-fascist movement veterans, Holocaust victims, concentration camp prisoners and tens of millions of people ... who sacrificed their lives for the sake of the fight against the Nazis' anti-human racial theory." Earlier in 2009, Russia berated the OSCE for equating Stalin with Hitler. Konstantin Kosachyov, who headed the committee for foreign relations of the Russian State Duma, told Interfax: "This is nothing but an attempt to re-write the history of World War Two. The reaction of the parliament to this document will be immediate and it will be harsh." As reported by Deutsche Welle, "Moscow's delegation boycotted the vote on the final day of a week-long session of the OSCE's parliamentary assembly after failing to have the resolution withdrawn." Earlier in May 2009, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev arranged the formation of a special commission (dissolved in 2012) to defend Russia from what he termed "historical falsifications", and in support of the valiant Soviet role in World War II for defeating Nazi Germany, which resulted in the most World War II casualties among the war powers. British journalist and Labour Party aide Seumas Milne posited that the impact of the post-Cold War narrative that Stalin and Hitler were twin evils, and therefore communism is as monstrous as Nazism, "has been to relativise the unique crimes of Nazism, bury those of colonialism and feed the idea that any attempt at radical social change will always lead to suffering, killing and failure."


title: Pig Beach

text: Pig Beach located on Big Major Cay (also known as Major Cay) is a beach on an uninhabited island (or cay) located in Exuma, the Bahamas. The island takes its unofficial name from the fact that it is populated by a colony of feral pigs which live on the island. It has become a tourist attraction in modern times.


title: Pig Beach

text: The pigs are known in popular culture as "the swimming pigs" although other islands with swimming pigs exist in the Bahamas.


title: Pig Beach

text: Exuma is a district of the Bahamas, and consists of over 360 islands. Near Big Major Cay is Staniel Cay. There are three freshwater springs on the island.


title: Pig Beach

text: A single, factual account of how the pigs ended up on the cay does not appear to exist. Folklore and various theories claim a number of different scenarios including pirates.


title: Pig Beach

text: Some say the pigs are said to have been dropped off on Big Major Cay by a group of sailors who wanted to come back and cook them. The sailors, though, never returned; the pigs survived on excess food dumped from passing ships.


title: Pig Beach

text: Another legend has it that the pigs were survivors of a shipwreck and managed to swim to shore, while other accounts claim that the pigs had escaped from a nearby islet. Yet others suggest that the pigs were part of a business scheme to attract tourists to the Bahamas while another claims the pigs were stocked on the island in the 1990s by residents of nearby Staniel Cay to raise for food.


title: Pig Beach

text: The pigs are now fed by residents from neighboring islands and tourists and the island is unofficially known as Pig Beach by both locals and tourists.


title: Pig Beach

text: In 2017, a number of the resident pigs were found dead which caused speculation regarding the cause of death including claims of tourists feeding pigs alcohol or the pigs ingesting sand.


title: Pig Beach

text: Big Major Cay is an island uninhabited by humans. The pig population was estimated between fifty and sixty pigs as of 2019. A few stray cats and goats can be found on the island as well.


title: Pig Beach

text: From Nassau to Pig Beach is 89 miles (143 km) and takes 2 hours by speed boat. A number of tour operators offer both private and group trips from Great Exuma, Staniel Cay, and other nearby cays.


title: Pig Beach

text: Pig beach has become a popular topic on social media sites like Instagram and featured in the television series, "The Bachelor". Some people claim to have been bitten by a pig while visiting. They have been written about in a book and claim to be featured in a documentary.


title: Maxwell House

text: Maxwell House is an American brand of coffee manufactured by a like-named division of Kraft Heinz in North America and JDE Peet's in the rest of the world. Introduced in 1892 by wholesale grocer Joel Owsley Cheek, it was named in honor of the Maxwell House Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee, which was its first major customer. For nearly 100 years, until the late 1980s, it was the highest-selling coffee brand in the United States. The company's slogan is "Good to the last drop," which is often incorporated into its logo and is printed on its labels.


title: Maxwell House

text: Maxwell House coffee has been owned and produced by several companies, starting with Cheek's company, Nashville Coffee and Manufacturing Company, then followed by General Foods, and Kraft Foods Inc.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1884 Joel Cheek moved to Nashville and met Roger Nolley Smith, a British coffee broker. He was said to be able to tell the origin of a coffee simply by smelling the green beans. Over the next few years, the two worked on finding the perfect blend. In 1892 Cheek approached the food buyer for the Maxwell House Hotel and gave him 20 pounds of his special blend for free. After a few days, the coffee was gone, and the hotel returned to using its usual brand. But after hearing complaints from patrons and others who liked Cheek's coffee better, the hotel bought Cheek's blend exclusively. After six months, the hotel agreed to allow Cheek to name his coffee after his first big sale.


title: Maxwell House

text: Inspired by his success, Cheek resigned from his job as a coffee broker and, with partner Maxwell Colbourne, formed a wholesale grocery distributor known as the "Nashville Coffee and Manufacturing Company". They specialized in coffee, with "Maxwell House Coffee", as it came to be known, as the central brand. Later, the Nashville Coffee and Manufacturing Company was renamed as the "Cheek-Neal Coffee Company". Over the next several years, the Maxwell House Coffee brand became a well-respected name that set it apart from the competition.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1915, Cheek-Neal began using a "Good to the last drop" slogan to advertise their Maxwell House Coffee. For several years, the ads made no claim of Theodore Roosevelt being the originator of the phrase. The company was then sold to General Foods which took over the Maxwell House brand. By the 1930s, the company was running advertisements that claimed that the former president had taken a sip of Maxwell House Coffee on a visit to Andrew Jackson's estate, The Hermitage, near Nashville on October 21, 1907, and when served the coffee, he proclaimed it to be "good to the last drop". During this time, Coca-Cola also used the slogan "Good to the last drop". Later, Maxwell House distanced itself from its original claim, admitting that the slogan was written by Clifford Spiller, former president of General Foods Corporation, and did not come from a Roosevelt remark overheard by Cheek-Neal. The phrase remains a registered trademark of the product and appears on its logo.


title: Maxwell House

text: The veracity of the Roosevelt connection to the phrase has never been historically established. In the local press coverage of Roosevelt's October 21 visit, a story concerning Roosevelt and the cup of coffee he drank features a quote that does not resemble the slogan. He is quoted as saying: "This is the kind of stuff I like to drink, by George, when I hunt bears." The Maxwell House Company claimed in its advertising that the Roosevelt story was true. In 2009, Maxwell House ran a commercial featuring Roosevelt repriser Joe Wiegand, who tells the "Last Drop" story.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1942 during World War II, General Foods Corporation, successor to the Postum Company established by Charles William Post, contracted to supply instant coffee to the U.S. armed forces. Beginning in the fall of 1945, this product, which by that time had come to be branded as Maxwell House Instant Coffee, entered test markets in the eastern U.S.; it began national distribution the following year.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1966 the company introduced "Maxwell House ElectraPerk", developed specifically for electric percolators.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1969 General Foods in the UK launched granulated coffee in a presentation at the London Hilton hotel, using a pantomime stage format in a show called "Once Upon a Coffee Time". In this story, the weak "Prince of Powdah" and his mentor "Reschem" travel the world in search of blends. Meeting and falling in love with "Princess Purity" and fighting the dragon "Old Hat", the young man emerges as "Prince Granulo", heir to the Kingdom of Maxwell. This show was written by Michael Ingrams, produced by the Mitchell Monkhouse Agency, and designed by Malcolm Lewis and Chris Miles of Media.


title: Maxwell House

text: In 1976 General Foods added "Maxwell House A.D.C." coffee, the name reflecting its intended use in automatic drip coffeemakers such as Mr. Coffee, which were superseding traditional coffee-preparation methods. In 1972, the company had introduced "Max-Pax" ground-coffee filter rings, aimed at the then still-strong market for percolator coffee preparation. Although this method, too, has been eclipsed, the Max-Pax concept was subsequently adapted as Maxwell House Filter Packs, first marketed by this name in 1989, for use in automatic coffee makers. By the 1990s, the company had quietly discontinued formulations for specific preparation methods.


title: Maxwell House

text: The brand is now marketed in ground and measured forms, as well as in whole-bean, flavored, and varietal blends. A higher-yield ground coffee, Maxwell House Master Blend, was introduced in 1981. Rich French Roast; Colombian Supreme, described as being 100% Colombian coffee; and 1892, described as a slow-roasted formulation, were all brought out in 1989, to compete in the increasingly competitive coffee market. In 1992, the company added cappuccino products to its line with Cappio Iced Cappuccino and Maxwell House Cappuccino in 1993. In recent years, the names of these products have been modified by the company to present a more uniform Maxwell House brand image.


title: Maxwell House

text: After Kraft Foods Inc. was split into two companies in 2012, the rights to the Maxwell House brands were divided and are currently owned by Kraft Heinz in North America and JDE Peet's (formed from merger of Douwe Egberts and Mondelez International coffee and tea division) in the rest of the world.


title: Maxwell House

text: General Foods marketed decaffeinated coffee under various brand names such as Sanka from 1927, and Brim and Maxim, the latter a freeze-dried instant coffee which is not decaffeinated, from the 1950s. But it refrained from selling Maxwell House-labeled decaffeinated coffee products until 1983, when it introduced ground Maxwell House Decaffeinated into East Coast markets. At the same time, it introduced a decaffeinated version of its long-established, lighter-tasting Yuban brand on the West Coast. Maxwell House Instant Decaffeinated Coffee came to store shelves in 1985. A further modification of the decaf theme, Maxwell House Lite, a reduced-caffeine blend, was introduced nationally in 1992 by Kraft General Foods and in its instant form the following year.


title: Maxwell House

text: During the 1920s, the Maxwell House brand began to be extensively advertised across the US. Total advertising expenditures rose from $19,955 in 1921 to $276,894 in 1924. The brand was cited as the most well-known coffee brand in a 1925 study of consumer goods.


title: Maxwell House

text: Maxwell House was the sponsor of "Maxwell House Coffee Time", which ran from 1937 to 1949 and featured Baby Snooks (a character portrayed by Fanny Brice), Charles Ruggles, Frank Morgan, Topper, and George Burns and Gracie Allen over the years in a predominately radio comedy and variety format. Maxwell House also sponsored "The Goldbergs" series on radio and later on television.


title: Maxwell House

text: Maxwell House was also the sponsor of the radio version of "Father Knows Best". Each episode began with the youngest daughter asking, "Mother, is Maxwell House really the best coffee in the whole world?", to which the mother would reply, "Well, your father says so, and Father Knows Best!" It was later replaced by Postum, a hot caffeine-free beverage that was touted as a calming beverage that would neither keep you up nor make you jittery.


title: Maxwell House

text: On Canadian television in the early 1980s, actor Ricardo Montalbán promoted Maxwell House in commercials with the theme "Morning and Maxwell House". In 1985, the company switched to more upbeat "Me and Max" campaigns with the common tagline "Hugga Mugga Max" and "Good to the last drop".


title: Maxwell House

text: Maxwell House was the long-time sponsor of the early television series "Mama", based on the play and film "I Remember Mama". It starred Peggy Wood as the matriarch of a Norwegian-American family. It ran on the CBS network from 1949 to 1957. This was perhaps the first example of product placement on a TV show, as the family frequently gathered around the kitchen table for a cup of Maxwell House coffee, though these segments, aired toward the end of each episode, were usually kept separate from the main storyline. Early television programs were frequently packaged by the advertising agencies of individual sponsors. As this practice became less common in the late 1950s, Maxwell House, like most national brands, turned to "spot" advertising, with agencies creating sometimes long-running campaigns in support of their products.


title: Maxwell House

text: One such 1970s campaign for Maxwell House featured the actress Margaret Hamilton, famous for playing the Wicked Witch of the West in the popular 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz", as Cora, the general store owner who proudly announced that Maxwell House was the only brand she sold. Maxwell House was also a well-known sponsor of "The Burns and Allen Show", during which time Maxwell House spots were incorporated into the plots of the radio scripts.


title: Maxwell House

text: Along with television advertising, Maxwell House used various print campaigns, always featuring the tagline "good to the last drop". The publication of its Passover Haggadah by the Joseph Jacobs Advertising Agency, beginning in 1932, made Maxwell House a household name with many American Jewish families. This was part of a marketing strategy by advertiser Jacobs, who also hired an Orthodox rabbi to certify that the coffee bean was technically not "kitniyot" (because it was more like a berry than a bean) and was, consequently, "kosher" for Passover. Maxwell House was the first coffee roaster to target a Jewish demographic. The Maxwell House Haggadah was also the Haggadah of choice for the annual White House Passover Seder which President Barack Obama conducted during his presidency from 2009 to 2016.


title: Maxwell House

text: Of its major manufacturing facilities, the third was established by Maxwell House in Jacksonville, Florida. This continues as its single operating plant today.


title: Maxwell House

text: The company first produced its coffee in Hoboken, New Jersey; this plant closed in the early 1990s. Its enormous rooftop sign, proclaiming the brand name and a dripping coffee cup, was a landmark visible in New York City across the Hudson River. The plant was later sold and demolished, and a condominium was subsequently built on the site. According to Ken Burns' "Baseball", the Hoboken site was the Elysian Fields, believed to be the site of the first organized baseball game.


title: Maxwell House

text: The company added plants in New Orleans; Houston, Texas; and San Leandro, California. The New Orleans plant was sold to Folgers, which continues to operate it as of June 2017.


title: Maxwell House

text: Kraft Foods sold the Houston plant to Maximus Coffee Group LP in late 2006. In March 2007, the neon coffee cup sign that glowed over the city's east end was removed from the side of the 16-story coffee roaster building and the plant closed in 2018. The San Leandro plant closed in 2016 and was slated to become the site of a business park.


title: Isis Hainsworth

text: Isis Hainsworth (born 22 September 1998) is a Scottish actress. She began her career on the West End. She is known for her roles in the BBC Three horror series "Red Rose" (2022) and the Netflix film "Metal Lords" (2022). She was named a 2022 "Screen International" Star of Tomorrow.


title: Isis Hainsworth

text: Hainsworth attended Leith Walk Primary School and then Drummond Community High School. She took extracurricular Higher and Advanced Higher Drama classes at Leith Academy alongside her standard school courses at Drummond. She also joined local theatre groups Lothian Youth Arts & Musicals Company and Strange Town Theatre. It was through the latter that she was suggested for "Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour". Shortly after completing school in 2016, Hainsworth moved to London for her career.


title: Isis Hainsworth

text: Hainsworth made her television debut in the 2016 with small roles in the BBC One miniseries "One of Us" (also known as "Retribution") as Maddy and the ITV drama "In Plainsight". She took over the lead role of Orla from Melissa Allan in the stage adaptation of "Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour" when it moved to the Duke of York's Theatre on the West End in 2017.


title: Isis Hainsworth

text: Hainsworth played Michelle McCullen and Louise Graham in the BBC One miniseries "Wanderlust" (2018) and "The Victim" (2019) respectively. She appeared in "Moonlight / Nightschool" at the Harold Pinter Theatre. For her performance as Hermia in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" at the Bridge Theatre, Hainsworth was nominated for a 2019 Ian Charleson Award. She appeared in the 2020 films "Emma." as Elizabeth Martin and "Misbehaviour" as Jenny.


title: Isis Hainsworth

text: In 2022, Hainsworth starred as Rochelle Mason alongside Amelia Clarkson in the BBC Three horror series "Red Rose" and Emily Spector alongside Jaeden Martell in the Netflix teen band film "Metal Lords". She also played Aelis in the Amazon Prime medieval comedy film "Catherine Called Birdy".


title: Liber

text: In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Liber ( , ; "the free one"), also known as Liber Pater ("the free Father"), was a god of viticulture and wine, male fertility and freedom. He was a patron deity of Rome's plebeians and was part of their Aventine Triad. His festival of Liberalia (March 17) became associated with free speech and the rights attached to coming of age. His cult and functions were increasingly associated with Romanised forms of the Greek Dionysus/Bacchus, whose mythology he came to share.


title: Liber

text: The name "Līber" ('free') stems from Proto-Italic "*leuþero", and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European "*h₁leudʰero" ('belonging to the people', hence 'free').


title: Liber

text: Before his official adoption as a Roman deity, Liber was companion to two different goddesses in two separate, archaic Italian fertility cults; Ceres, an agricultural and fertility goddess of Rome's Hellenised neighbours, and Libera, who was Liber's female equivalent. In ancient Lavinium, he was a phallic deity. Latin "liber" means "free", or the "free one"; when coupled with "pater", it means "The Free Father", who personifies freedom and champions its attendant rights, as opposed to dependent servitude. The word 'liber' is also understood in regard of the concept libation, ritual offering of drink, which in Greek relates to 'spondé', literally related to English 'to spend'. Roman writers of the late Republic and early Empire offer various etymological and poetic speculations based on this trope, to explain certain features of Liber's cult.


title: Liber

text: Liber entered Rome's historical tradition soon after the overthrow of the Roman monarchy, the establishment of the Republic and the first of many threatened or actual plebeian secessions from Rome's patrician authority. According to Livy, the dictator A. Postumius vowed games "(ludi)" and a joint public temple to a Triad of Ceres, Liber and Libera on Rome's Aventine Hill, c.496 BC. In 493 the vow was fulfilled: the new Aventine temple was dedicated and "ludi scaenici" (religious dramas) were held in honour of Liber, for the benefit of the Roman people. These early "ludi scaenici" have been suggested as the earliest of their kind in Rome, and may represent the earliest official festival to Liber, or an early form of his Liberalia festival. The formal, official development of the Aventine Triad may have encouraged the assimilation of its individual deities to Greek equivalents: Ceres to Demeter, Liber to Dionysus and Libera to Persephone or Kore.


title: Liber

text: Liber's patronage of Rome's largest, least powerful class of citizens (the plebs, or plebeian commoners) associates him with particular forms of plebeian disobedience to the civil and religious authority claimed by Rome's Republican patrician elite. The Aventine Triad has been described as parallel to the Capitoline Triad of Jupiter, Mars and Quirinus on the Capitoline Hill, within the city's sacred boundary (pomerium): and as its "copy and antithesis". The Aventine Triad was apparently installed at the behest of the Sibylline Books but Liber's position within it seems equivocal from the outset. He was a god of the grape and of wine; his early "ludi scaenici" virtually defined their genre thereafter as satirical, subversive theatre in a lawful religious context. Some aspects of his cults remained potentially un-Roman and offered a focus for civil disobedience. Liber asserted plebeian rights to ecstatic release, self-expression and free speech; he was "Liber Pater", the Free Father – a divine personification of liberty, father of plebeian wisdoms and plebeian augury.


title: Liber

text: Liber's associations with wine, inebriation, uninhibited freedom and the subversion of the powerful made him a close equivalent to the Greek god Dionysus, who was Romanised as Bacchus. In Graeco-Roman culture, Dionysus was euhemerised as a historical figure, a heroic saviour, world-traveller and founder of cities; and conqueror of India, whence he had returned in the first ever triumph, drawn in a golden chariot by tigers, accompanied by a retinue of drunken satyrs and maenads. In some cults, and probably in the popular imagination, Liber was gradually assimilated to Bacchus and came to share his Romanised "Dionysian" iconography and myths. Pliny calls him "the first to establish the practice of buying and selling; he also invented the diadem, the emblem of royalty, and the triumphal procession." Roman mosaics and sarcophagi attest to various representations of this exotic triumphal procession. In Roman and Greek literary sources from the late Republic and Imperial era, several notable triumphs feature similar, distinctively "Bacchic" processional elements, recalling the supposedly historic "Triumph of Liber".


title: Liber

text: Very little is known of Liber's official and unofficial cults during the early to middle Republican era. Their Dionysiac or Bacchic elements seem to have been regarded as tolerably ancient, home-grown and manageable by Roman authorities until 186 BC, shortly after the end of the Second Punic War. Livy, writing 200 years after the event, gives a highly theatrical account of the Bacchanalia's introduction by a foreign soothsayer, a "Greek of mean condition... a low operator of sacrifices". The cult spreads in secret, "like a plague". The lower classes, plebeians, women, the young, morally weak and effeminate males ("men most like women") are particularly susceptible: all such persons have "leuitas animi" (fickle or uneducated minds) but even Rome's elite are not immune. The Bacchanalia's priestesses urge their deluded flock to break all social and sexual boundaries, even to visit ritual murder on those who oppose them or betray their secrets: but a loyal servant reveals all to a shocked senate, whose quick thinking, wise actions and piety save Rome from the divine wrath and disaster it would otherwise have suffered. Livy's "dramatis personae", stylistic flourishes and tropes probably draw on Roman satyr-plays rather than the Bacchanalia themselves.


title: Liber

text: The Bacchanalia cults may have offered challenge to Rome's traditional, official values and morality but they were practiced in Roman Italy as Dionysiac cults for several decades before their alleged disclosure, and were probably no more secretive than any other mystery cult. Nevertheless, their presence at the Aventine provoked an investigation. The consequent legislation against them – the "Senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus" of 186 BC – was framed as if in response to a dire and unexpected national and religious emergency, and its execution was unprecedented in thoroughness, breadth and ferocity. Modern scholarship interprets this reaction as the senate's assertion of its own civil and religious authority throughout the Italian peninsula, following the recent Punic War and subsequent social and political instability. The cult was officially represented as the workings of a secret, illicit state within the Roman state, a conspiracy of priestesses and misfits, capable of anything. Bacchus himself was not the problem; like any deity, he had a right to cult. Rather than risk his divine offense, the Bacchanalia were not banned outright. They were made to submit to official regulation, under threat of ferocious penalties: some 6,000 persons are thought to have been put to death. The reformed Bacchic cults bore little resemblance to the crowded, ecstatic and uninhibited Bacchanalia: every cult meeting was restricted to five initiates and each could be held only with a praetor's consent. Similar attrition may have been imposed on Liber's cults; attempts to sever him from perceived or actual associations with the Bacchanalia seems clear from the official transference of the Liberalia "ludi" of 17 March to Ceres' Cerealia of 12–19 April. Once the ferocity of official clampdown eased off, the Liberalia games were officially restored, though probably in modified form. Illicit Bacchanals persisted covertly for many years, particularly in Southern Italy, their likely place of origin.


title: Liber

text: Liber was closely, often interchangeably identified with Bacchus, Dionysus and their mythology but was not entirely subsumed by them; in the late Republican era, Cicero could insist on the "non-identity of Liber and Dionysus" and describe Liber and Libera as children of Ceres. Liber, like his Aventine companions, carried elements of his older cults into official Roman religion. He protected various aspects of agriculture and fertility, including the vine and the "soft seed" of its grapes, wine and wine vessels, and male fertility and virility. As his divine power was incarnate in the vine, grape and wine, he was offered the first, sacred pressing of the grape-harvest, known as "sacrima".


title: Liber

text: The wine produced under Liber's patronage was his gift to humankind, and therefore fit for profane (non-religious) use: it could be mixed with old wine for the purposes of fermentation, and otherwise adulterated and diluted according to taste and circumstance. For religious purposes, it was ritually "impure" ("vinum spurcum"). Roman religious law required that the libations offered to the gods in their official cults should be "vinum inferum", a strong wine of pure vintage, also known as "temetum". It was made from the best of the crop, selected and pressed under the patronage of Rome's sovereign deity Jupiter and ritually purified by his "flamen" (senior priest). Liber's role in viniculture and wine-making was thus both complementary and subservient to Jupiter's.


title: Liber

text: Liber also personified male procreative power, which was ejaculated as the "soft seed" of human and animal semen. His temples held the image of a phallus; in Lavinium, this was the principal focus for his month-long festival, when according to St. Augustine, the "dishonourable member" was placed "on a little trolley" and taken in procession around the local crossroad shrines, then to the local forum for its crowning by an honourable matron. The rites ensured the growth of seeds and repelled any malicious enchantment ("fascinatus") from fields.


title: Liber

text: Liber's festivals are timed to the springtime awakening and renewal of fertility in the agricultural cycle. In Rome, his annual Liberalia public festival was held on March 17. A portable shrine was carried through Rome's neighbourhoods ("vici"); Liber's aged, ivy-crowned priestesses (Sacerdos Liberi) offered honey cakes for sale, and offered sacrifice on behalf of those who bought them – the discovery of honey was credited to Liber-Bacchus. Embedded within Liberalia, more or less at a ritualistic level, were the various freedoms and rights attached to Roman ideas of virility as a divine and natural force. Young men celebrated their coming of age; they cut off and dedicated their first beards to their household Lares and if citizens, wore their first "toga virilis", the "manly" toga – which Ovid, perhaps by way of poetic etymology, calls a "toga libera" (Liber's toga or "toga of freedom"). These new citizens registered their citizenship at the forum and were then free to vote, to leave their father's "domus" (household), choose a marriage partner and, thanks to Liber's endowment of virility, father their own children. Ovid also emphasises the less formal freedoms and rights of Liberalia. From his later place of exile, where he was sent for an unnamed offense against Augustus having to do with free speech, Ovid lamented the lost companionship of his fellow poets, who apparently saw the Liberalia as an opportunity for uninhibited talking.


title: Liber

text: Augustus successfully courted the plebs, supported their patron deities and began the restoration of the Aventine Triad's temple; it was re-dedicated by his successor, Tiberius. Liber is found in some of the threefold, complementary deity-groupings of Imperial cult; a saviour figure, like Hercules and the Emperor himself. The reign and dynasty of the emperor Septimius Severus were inaugurated with games to honour Liber/Shadrafa and Hercules/Melqart, the Romanised founding hero-deities of his native town, Leptis Magna (North Africa). He built them a massive temple and arch in Rome. Later still, Liber Pater is of one of many deities served by the erudite, deeply religious senator Vettius Agorius Praetextatus (c. AD 315 – 384).


title: Liber

text: A Bacchic community shrine dedicated to Liber Pater was established in Cosa (in modern Tuscany), probably during the 4th century AD. It remained in use "apparently for decades after the edicts of Theodosius in 391 and 392 AD outlawing paganism". Its abandonment, or perhaps its destruction "by zealous Christians", was so abrupt that much of its cult paraphernalia survived virtually intact beneath the building's later collapse. Around the end of the 5th century, in Orosius's "Seven Books of History Against the Pagans", Liber Pater's mythic conquest of India is taken as an historical event, which left a harmless, naturally peaceful nation "dripping with blood, full of corpses, and polluted with [Liber's] lusts."


title: Liber

text: Pliny the Elder describes the Aventine Triad's temple as designed by Greek architects, and typically Greek in style; no trace remains of it, and the historical and epigraphical record offers only sparse details to suggest its exact location, but Pliny's description may be further evidence of time-honoured and persistent plebeian cultural connections with Magna Graecia, well into the Imperial era. Vitruvius recommends that Liber's temples follow an Ionic Greek model, as a "just measure between the severe manner of the Doric and the tenderness of the Corinthian," respectful of the deity's part-feminine characteristics.


title: Liber

text: Gods named Liber and Libera play a major role in the science fiction/time-travel novel "Household Gods" by Harry Turtledove and Judith Tarr.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul Williams (December 1, 1934 – April 24, 2016), known professionally as Billy Paul, was a Grammy Award-winning American soul singer, known for his 1972 No. 1 single "Me and Mrs. Jones", as well as the 1973 album and single "War of the Gods", which blends his more conventional pop, soul, and funk styles with electronic and psychedelic influences.


title: Billy Paul

text: He was one of the many artists associated with the Philadelphia soul sound created by Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff, and Thom Bell. Paul was identified by his diverse vocal style, which ranged from mellow and soulful to low and raspy. Questlove of the Roots equated Paul with Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder, calling him "one of the criminally unmentioned proprietors of socially conscious post-revolution '60s civil rights music."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul was raised in North Philadelphia. His love of music began at a young age, listening at home to his family's music collection.


title: Billy Paul

text: He recalled: "That's how I really got indoctrinated into music. My mother was always...collecting records and she would buy everything from "Jazz at Philharmonic Hall" to Nat King Cole." He began singing along and tried to emulate the records he heard: "I always liked Nat King Cole. I always wanted to go my own way, but I always favored other singers like Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald – I loved Ella Fitzgerald. There are so many of them. Nina Simone was one of my favorites – Johnny Mathis, They all had a style, a silkiness about them... I wanted to sing silky, like butter – mellow. I wanted to sing mellow you know what I mean. One of my favorites is Jessie Belvin – they used to call him Mr. Easy. A lot of people forgot about him you know – Sam Cooke is another one of my favorites."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul explained why he was particularly influenced by female jazz singers: "I think the reason behind that is because of my high range. The male singers who had the same range I did, when I was growing up, didn't do much for me. But put on Nina Simone, Carmen McRae or Nancy Wilson, and I'd be in seventh heaven. Female vocalists just did more with their voices, and that's why I paid more attention to them." Perhaps the female vocalist who had the most impact on him was Billie Holiday, whom he called "a BIG influence". He began developing a vocal style that would eventually incorporate traces of jazz, R&B, and pop.


title: Billy Paul

text: He began his singing career at the age of 11, appearing on local radio station WPEN, then owned by the local "Philadelphia Bulletin" newspaper. He attended the West Philadelphia Music School and the Granoff School of Music for formal vocal training. He recalled: "Well you know, it was something that my mum would say I needed, holding my notes you know, and delivering my notes. It gave me assurity, cos my mother was 100% behind me and it created the style and uniqueness of Billy Paul. All my life I wanted to sound like myself, I never wanted to sound like anybody else. How that occurred was cause I always wanted to be a saxophone player...I took my uniqueness and treated it like a horn, which created a good style for me."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's popularity grew and led to appearances in clubs and at college campuses nationally. He changed his name from Paul Williams to Billy Paul so as to avoid any confusion with other artists such as songwriter Paul Williams and saxophonist Paul "Hucklebuck" Williams. He explained: "I had Jules Malvin, who was like my play father. He was my manager at the time. He took me up to the Apollo and I warmed the Apollo for six weeks and that’s where he gave me the name Billy Paul. I didn't question it."


title: Billy Paul

text: In 1952, he traveled to New York City and entered the recording studio for Jubilee Records. Backed by Tadd Dameron on piano and Jackie Davis on the Hammond organ, Paul released his first single that April: "Why Am I" with "That's Why I Dream" as the B-side (Jubilee Records 5081, both written by Bernard Sacks and B. Sidney Zeff). "Billboard" reviewed the tracks favorably, saying of "Why Am I" that it was "Expressive warbling of a moody ballad, by the label's new 16-year-old chanter", and of "That's Why I Dream": "Organ and piano lend the singer a hand in this slow-paced etching of a romantic number".


title: Billy Paul

text: In June 1952, Paul released his second single – this time collaborating with the Buddy Lucas Orchestra – "You Didn't Know", backed with "The Stars Are Mine" (Jubilee Records 5086). "Billboard" was again positive, saying about "You Didn't Know" – "Billy Paul, new young singer, makes an impressive bow on the label with a strong performance of a weeper ballad which should pick up spins and plays. The Lucas ork furnishes okay backing. A good disk" and about "The Stars Are Mine" – "Paul sings this new tune more quietly, over a smooth ork reading. Side is not as exciting as flip and tune is not as strong." A few weeks later, Jubilee took out an ad in "Billboard" to promote their artists in anticipation of the annual NAMM Show – the music industry trade convention put on by the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM). Jubilee plugged Paul's latest single and noted: "He's New – He's Hot!" Despite Jubilee's efforts, none of the tracks by the young singer made the charts.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul and the other members of the 7th Army Band, including Don Ellis, Leo Wright and Ron Anthony, used the service to further their musical careers as best they could—careers they knew would continue once they returned to civilian life. Paul said: "I sang in the service, I sang with a jazz band. So when I came out I sang Jazz, going to clubs and so forth.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul also did some boxing in the Army – a sport he had grown up with, as he explained in a 2012 interview: "Yeah we had a gym and all my friends from my neighborhood were boxers. Even during my army days I boxed as well as singing. Actually I still go to the gym; both me and my wife have trainers... Miles Davis would always say: 'Come to the gym! I'm gonna beat your ass!' Then one time I got hit too hard and I said no I'm going to sing!... That made my mind up."


title: Billy Paul

text: After his discharge, Paul formed a jazz trio with hard bop pianist Sam Dockery and bassist Buster Williams. In 1959 he joined the New Dawn record label and released the single "Ebony Woman" backed with "You'll Go to Hell" (New Dawn 1001), both written by Morris Bailey Jr. In 1960, Paul recorded "There's a Small Hotel" (Finch 1005, written by Rodgers and Hart), backed with "I'm Always A Brother" (Finch 1006, written by Leon Mitchell and Charles Gaston). None of these songs charted, but Paul would resurrect and re-record both "Ebony Woman" and "There's a Small Hotel" in later years.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul was a brief stand-in for one of the ailing Blue Notes with Harold Melvin. Paul remembered: "Well, I didn’t want to dance so Harold Melvin fired me (laughs). I had a six month stay with the Flamingos – I was with The Flamingos for a while." It was around this time that Paul established a lifelong friendship with Marvin Gaye—both singers filling in with other groups. Paul recalled: "I was one of the Blue Notes at one time and Marvin Gaye was in the Moonglows... We were such good friends. We never did a record together and that would have been one of my dreams. And you know what one of my fascinations is? What we would be doing if he were here today. I think about Marvin every day. The love I have for this man is unbelievable. We were close, we were like brothers. When I would go on the road out in California, he would go round to the house – he and Blanche (Billy's wife) [would] make sure Blanche’s mother would take her insulin because she was a diabetic. I would heavily depend on him to make sure she ate and took her insulin. That’s how close we were. You know sometimes, even today. I wake up and hope it was a dream, but it’s real – it’s real you know."


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2012, Paul was asked how important the city of Philadelphia was to him and what the Philly sound is: "It's very very important to me. I was born here and so many great and influential artists come from here as well. Its a city of its own and has its own sound. I think what makes it different is the drama; you know how they say everyone marches to their own beat? Well I think Philly has its own beat as well, and it's distinctive. It sounds easy, but it's hard to play."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul and his wife and manager Blanche Williams were in the process of recording his debut album when they met Kenny Gamble. Paul recalled:


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's debut album "Feelin' Good at the Cadillac Club" was released in 1968 on the Gamble label. Largely a collection of jazz covers of songs popularized by others, it was a studio album that attempted to recreate the feel of Paul's live club performances. Neither the single "Bluesette" nor the album reached the charts. The album was re-released in 1973.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's second LP, "Ebony Woman" (1970), was a more commercial release on Gamble & Huff's Neptune label. Paul cut a new version of his 1959 single and made it the title track. Gamble & Huff were firmly in control of the production. Merging jazz and soul, the LP achieved some modest success reaching No. 12 on the "Billboard" soul chart an No. 183 on the pop chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: After Neptune folded, Gamble and Huff started their third label – Philadelphia International Records (PIR) – and brought Paul with them. Gamble and Huff signed a distribution deal with Clive Davis and CBS Records.


title: Billy Paul

text: "Going East" (1971) was the first Billy Paul album released on the Philadelphia International Records label, making full use of the label's regular group of ace musicians MFSB at Sigma Sound Studios. As they had done on the previous LP, Gamble and Huff sought to find the balance between Paul's jazz roots and the funky soul that they hoped would bring mainstream success. Paul nearly reached the charts with the single "Magic Carpet Ride" (cover of the 1968 Steppenwolf hit) and the album climbed to No. 42 on the "Billboard" soul chart and No. 197 on the pop chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: With each album, Gamble and Huff were moving closer to realizing the sound they envisioned for Billy Paul, and they achieved it with the 1972 album "360 Degrees of Billy Paul" and the single "Me and Mrs. Jones". Both the album and song received commercial and critical acclaim.


title: Billy Paul

text: "Me and Mrs. Jones" was a No. 1 hit for the last three weeks of 1972, selling two million copies (platinum single status), and went on to win Paul a Grammy Award. The gold album and platinum single broke the artist on world charts, including the United Kingdom, where the single entered the Top 20 of the UK Singles Chart, reaching No. 12 in early 1973. In the years since then, the song has been covered numerous times, most notably by The Dramatics in 1974, Freddie Jackson in 1992 and Michael Bublé in 2007. Paul recalled the Grammy win and the song's overall success: "Oh man! I was up against Ray Charles, I was up against Curtis Mayfield, I was up against Isaac Hayes. I was in the Wilberforce University in Ohio, I had to go do a homecoming – my wife and her mother went. And when I see Ringo Starr call my name, I said Ohhh... Yeah... The most sobering thing is to have a number one record across the whole entire world in all languages. It’s a masterpiece, it’s a classic."


title: Billy Paul

text: The song was PIR's first No. 1. In addition, the label was enjoying considerable success with their other artists, including the O'Jays and Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes. Paul remembered the atmosphere at the label: "It was like a family full of music. It was like music round the clock, you know."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's massive success was short-lived. The follow-up single – "Am I Black Enough for You?" – failed to reach the heights of "Mrs. Jones", with the song's Black Power political message proving too much for mainstream radio's taste. There was much controversy surrounding the choice to release this track as the follow-up to a cross-over smash hit.


title: Billy Paul

text: Decades later, Paul was more philosophical about the song: "That was what I had with 'Am I Black Enough.' I wanted – I'm gonna make it this time and come out. I think it's true to the audience, cos they look for something to come out compared to Mrs. Jones and that was Clive Davis' idea to do that. I think it was Kenny and Clive Davis, but I think it was mostly Clive Davis." For his part, Davis has said that he opposed releasing the song as a single. Still, Davis called it an "all time great record, all time great performance". Gamble, the co-writer and producer of the track, said the song "was great and Billy sounded great doing it". Paul reflected: "Well you know... For a long time I was angry about it, I had a bit of a letdown. Now the song is ahead of its time. I feel as though I let the song down when I went into my darkness. I feel like I abandoned the song. And I'm still going to get to the bottom of 'Am I Black Enough'."


title: Billy Paul

text: Ultimately, "360 Degrees of Billy Paul" reached No. 1 on the "Billboard" soul chart and No. 17 on the pop chart. Despite the disappointment over the chart performance of "Am I Black Enough", there was no reason to believe that he could not replicate the album's success or reach even greater heights. In May 1973, while still promoting "360 Degrees of Billy Paul", he was asked about a follow-up LP: "I'm afraid that there will be something of a delay. As of right now, there are two sides actually completed. I have to tell you about one of them — Kenny and Leon wrote it especially and it's a definite single at some point. It's called 'I Was Married' and I honestly think it will be bigger than 'Me and Mrs. Jones'. But for me, there are still two singles from the "360 Degrees" album — 'Brown Baby' and 'I'm Just a Prisoner'. But, we are starting to work on the album more seriously from May 15." Despite Paul's enthusiasm, neither "Brown Baby" or "I'm Just a Prisoner" were released in U.S., although "Brown Baby" was issued in the UK but failed to chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: "Me and Mrs. Jones" was such a huge hit that Gamble and Huff decided to re-release Paul's first two albums, "Feelin' Good at the Cadillac Club" and "Ebony Woman". Reissued in 1973, both albums featured new cover art and were a boon to new fans hungry for Billy Paul product who had already purchased his first two PIR LPs. Still, neither reissue was terribly successful, with only "Ebony Woman" re-entering the album charts at No. 186 Pop and No. 43 Soul.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's next album, "War of the Gods", was the follow-up to "360 Degrees of Billy Paul" and was issued in November 1973. Unique in Paul's catalog, it contains lengthy psychedelic soul, song suites and marked a conceptual and musical advance for Paul that did not go unrecognized by critics and fans. And while the LP and its singles enjoyed some success, Paul was unable to repeat the kind of wide impact he had with his previous album and "Mrs. Jones". The "War of the Gods" single "Thanks for Saving My Life", backed with "I Was Married" as the B-side, was a top-40 hit, reaching No. 37 on the pop chart and a top-10 soul record, reaching No. 9. It also reached No. 33 in the UK.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's 1973 European tour with the O'Jays and the Intruders spawned his first true live album: "Live in Europe". Recorded in London and released in 1974, it reached No. 10 on the "Billboard" Soul Album chart and No. 187 on the pop chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: "Got My Head on Straight" was released in 1975 and was an attempt to return to the successful formula of "360 Degrees of Billy Paul". A collection of jazzy, soulful, funky, pop songs, it reached No. 140 on the "Billboard" Pop Album chart and No. 20 on the Soul chart. It included the singles "Be Truthful to Me" (No. 37 R&B); "Billy's Back Home" (No. 52 R&B); and "July, July, July, July", which did not chart. Despite the attempted return to form, the lack of mainstream success was a major disappointment to Paul, Gamble and Huff, and everyone at PIR.


title: Billy Paul

text: "When Love is New" followed in the same vein as its predecessor and had a similar fate. Released in December 1975, it reached No. 139 on the "Billboard" Pop Album chart and No. 17 on the Soul chart. It included the singles "Let's Make a Baby", which hit No. 83 on the Pop singles chart (the last record of Paul's to make that chart), No. 18 on the Soul chart and No. 30 in the UK, and "People Power", which reached No. 82 on the Soul chart and No. 14 on the U.S. Dance chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: "Let's Make a Baby" proved controversial and there were calls to ban or alter the track because of its supposed obscene or negative message. Jesse Jackson and Operation PUSH led the movement against this song and others such as Hall & Oates's "Rich Girl" and the Four Tops' "Catfish". The campaign was waged locally, with individual stations making their own choices about how to handle the matter. For example, leading R&B station WWRL in New York City played "Let's Make a Baby" but decided not to announce its title. Other stations went so far as to alter the lyrics. Privately, several black disc jockeys described the controversy as "Jessie's phony crusade against sex on the air." The disc jockeys – who refused to allow their names to be used for fear of reprisals – accused Jackson of being "absolutely dishonest" about the campaign, with one popular radio personality making reference to Richard Pryor's 1975 appearance at one of Jackson's events:


title: Billy Paul

text: The disc jockeys further pointed out that Jackson was not critical of other artists, such as Roberta Flack and the Brothers Johnson, who had similarly suggestive songs like "Jesse" and "Get the Funk Out of My Face" but who were supporters of Operation PUSH. Several radio veterans were convinced that Jackson's actions were little more than a publicity stunt, calling it "just another of his gimmicks, which he will soon drop for another, just to stay in the news."


title: Billy Paul

text: Surprisingly, the controversy only escalated with the release of Paul's next album, "Let 'Em In" in late 1976. The title track was a funky soul version of Paul McCartney's No. 3 U.S. hit from earlier that summer. While McCartney's version was heavy on personal references and comparatively light on political figures, Billy Paul's version turned the formula on its head to become a kind of civil rights anthem – albeit one with a personal touch due to the mention of his recently deceased twin sister Pauline Williams. As where McCartney only obliquely refers to "Brother John" (John Lennon or brother-in-law John Eastman or John F. Kennedy) and "Martin Luther" (the martyred civil rights leader or the 16th-century theologian), Billy Paul's version is far more explicit in reciting a list of deceased civil rights leaders (Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, Medgar Evers, and Louis Armstrong). Furthermore, interspersed with Billy Paul's verses are memorable passages of speeches by Malcolm X and King.


title: Billy Paul

text: Yet, just as they had done with "Let's Make a Baby", WVON – Chicago's oldest black-oriented radio station – altered the song. This time an engineer at the station spliced in a parts of a speech by Jesse Jackson as a substitute for parts of King's speech. "Chicago Tribune" columnist Gary Deeb said the station "mutilated" the song, doing so in order to solidify ties with Jackson, and called the whole episode "simply ridiculous". Paul was furious and said that he had the "shock of my life" when he learned of the alteration.


title: Billy Paul

text: Reverend George Clements, the crusading pastor of Holy Angels Catholic Church on the South Side of Chicago, presented Paul with an award for the song on Billy Paul Day, May 23, 1977, that included a ceremony at the church with the church's school choir performing the song. When informed of the honor by Father Clements, Paul reportedly cried tears of joy. Clements said:


title: Billy Paul

text: In all, "Let 'Em In" was Paul's first LP to crack the top 100 pop album chart since 1972's "360 Degrees of Billy Paul", reaching No. 88. Paul also had his usual success on the Soul charts, with the album hitting No. 27 and the singles "How Good is Your Game", "I Trust You", and "Let 'Em In" reaching Nos. 50, 79, and 91 respectively. Paul's version of the Elton John hit "Your Song" cracked the top 40 in the U.K., reaching No. 38.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul released "Only the Strong Survive" in 1977 and it proved to be his final charting album, reaching No. 152 on the Pop chart and No. 36 Soul. The LP's title track was the first single, reaching No. 68 on the Soul chart and No. 33 in the UK. The next time Paul's voice would be heard during the summer of 1977 was on the track "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto", featuring the "Philadelphia International All-Stars": Billy Paul, Lou Rawls, Archie Bell, Teddy Pendergrass, Dee Dee Sharp Gamble, and Eddie Levert and Walter Williams of The O'Jays. The song reached No. 91 on the Pop chart and No. 4 on the Soul chart. The "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto" album also included the Billy Paul tracks (both written by Gamble & Huff) "New Day" and "New World Comin'". All proceeds from the album and single went toward a program to benefit inner-cities throughout the U.S. Paul followed up the success of both his "Only the Strong Survive" single and "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto" with "Sooner or Later" – another track from his latest LP. Yet the track failed to chart as did "Don't Give Up on Us" and "Everybody's Breaking Up", which was officially released in the U.K. but only issued to radio in the U.S.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's final studio album for Philadelphia International was "First Class", released in 1979. It was the first album since his 1968 debut "Feelin' Good at the Cadillac Club" that did not make either the Pop or Soul charts. The LP's first single "Bring the Family Back" failed to chart but a 12" disco version did reach No. 90 on the Soul chart and No. 51 on the Dance chart. "False Faces" was also released in both single and 12" disco versions but neither charted.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's run at Philadelphia International officially ended with the 1980 release "Best of Billy Paul". This double-album compilation included four previously unreleased tracks: "You're My Sweetness", "Next to Nature", "What Are We Going to Do Now That He's Back", and "My Old Flame". The UK version was a single LP titled "Billy Paul's Greatest Hits" with a different track listing and only one of the "new" songs: "You're My Sweetness". That song was released as a single and reached No. 69 on the Soul chart. Paul's final single for Philadelphia International was an edited version of a song from his first Philadelphia International album "Going East": "Jesus Boy (You Only Look Like a Man)", which failed to chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: Numerous "best of" compilations of Paul's Philadelphia International work have been released over the years, though critics have made plain that most have failed to capture the right balance of singles and album tracks to fully represent the depth and breadth of his PIR output. For example, AllMusic's Andrew Hamilton said of the 2002 collection "Super Hits": "If you didn't live and die with Billy Paul's albums when he cranked them out on Philadelphia International Records, you won't have a clue as to what his fans want to hear. To compile a CD from Paul's singles is to compile a mediocre collection; you have to supplement the singles with choice LP cuts. And with a brief ten-track collection like this, some of the singles should have been replaced with a few of Paul's icy album joints." By contrast, Jason Ankeny said that the 1999 compilation "Me & Mrs. Jones: Best of Billy Paul" "goes far beyond the classic title track in restoring the singer to prominence, showcasing his versatility via superb covers of pop favorites... [and] the inclusion of R&B chart hits... it all adds up to a definitive portrait of Paul in his prime."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul was on the Philadelphia International label, in all, for nine years and while he enjoyed considerable success – especially with "Me and Mrs. Jones" – critics generally agree that he deserved better. Andrew Hamilton put it bluntly: "Gamble and Huff did a horrible job picking Paul's singles. Some better choices, and his career might have been Hall-of-Famish." Similarly, Jason Ankeny wrote: "Too easily dismissed as little more than a one-hit wonder, Billy Paul was, in fact, one of the most gifted and affecting talents to grace the Philadelphia International stable – the recipient of some of the Gamble and Huff team's most lush and sophisticated productions. His deeply soulful voice bridged the gap between jazz and soul, textured in equal measure by street-smart swagger and touching vulnerability."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul made two studio albums in the 1980s. The first, "Lately", was released in 1985 and was a dramatic musical departure from the lush Philadelphia Soul of his previous efforts. Recorded for Lonnie Simmons' Total Experience Records, the album's synthesizer and keyboard-driven tracks (typical of music production at the time) were closer to Simmons' work with the Gap Band and Yarbrough and Peoples than they were to Paul's '70s orchestrated wall of sound. The album's title track, a ballad, was released as a single in the U.K. but did not chart. The follow-up single – a slow jam called "Sexual Therapy" – fared better, climbing to No. 80 on the U.K. charts.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's final studio album was 1988's "Wide Open" for the Ichiban label. Similar in production style to his previous release, though perhaps a bit smoother, it reached No. 61 on the Soul chart. However, the singles "We Could Have Been" and "I Just Love You So Much" failed to chart.


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul announced his retirement in 1989 on stage in London. But like so many artists before him, he could not resist the temptation to continue to play live shows and record. In 2009 he was asked how he was enjoying his retirement in South Jersey: "Retired? Are you serious?"


title: Billy Paul

text: Post-"retirement", Paul regularly toured in the U.S. and abroad playing small clubs, hotel ballrooms, Las Vegas showrooms, Jazz festivals, and theaters. Asked in 2012 whether playing in Philadelphia held special meaning to him, he said: "I try to feel comfortable wherever I play, but they call it being a native son and I do get a lot of respect there so it is special. The reaction internationally is great as well, so even in Paris or Brazil we have great audiences. Songs like Mrs. Jones are huge everywhere so I do perform a lot overseas."


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2000 he released a CD – "Live World Tour 1999–2000" – on his own label, "PhillySounds". Recorded in São Paulo, Brazil; Paris, France; Bermuda, and Philadelphia, it contained the following tracks: "Billy's Back Home", "Love Buddies", "When Love is New", "This is Your Life", "Thanks for Saving My Life", "Let's Get It On/What's Going On", "War of the Gods", "I Believe I Can Fly", "Your Song", "Without You", and "Mr & Mrs. Jones". Two years later, a complete show from that tour was released outside the U.S. on the PID label. Titled "Your Songs: Live in Paris", it was recorded in December 2000 at a private event for the RFM TV Channel at Studio 287 in Paris, France. It includes the songs "July, July, July, July", "Only the Strong Survive", "It's Too Late", "Brown Baby", "Let 'Em In", "It's Critical", "False Faces", and "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto", among others.


title: Billy Paul

text: As these live albums illustrate, Paul's concert set lists were varied, containing both his own songs as well as cover versions of jazz, soul, rock, and pop tunes. For example, his September 16, 2001, Sunday afternoon show at Gloria's Seafood in Philadelphia featured "Billy Boy", "Billy's Back Home", "Just in Time", "Old Folks", "Sleeping Bee", "Ebony Woman", "Thanks for Saving My Life", "Love Buddies", "April in Paris/I Love Paris", and "Me and Mrs. Jones".


title: Billy Paul

text: His show of June 12, 2011, in São Paulo, Brazil consisted of "Thanks for Saving My Life", "I Will Survive" (performed by backing vocalist Anna Jordan), "Hello", "Purple Rain", "Smile", "Mrs. Robinson", "Your Song", "Me and Mrs. Jones", and "You Are So Beautiful".


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2000, Nike began airing a commercial featuring track and field star Marion Jones – the face of Team USA for the 2000 Summer Olympics, winning five medals, which were all later stripped from her for cheating. The campaign, entitled "Mrs. Jones", depicted the athlete as a half-hidden DJ talking about issues such as education and better pay for female athletes. The ad also featured Paul's studio recording of "Me and Mrs. Jones". Paul saw the commercial and contacted an attorney, who filed suit in a federal district court in Los Angeles against both the sportswear company and its advertising agency, Wieden & Kennedy. Paul sought $1 million in lost licensing fees, arguing that the company had cheated him by not obtaining his permission to use the song. A spokesperson for the ad agency called the decision to air the song without permission "a very stupid mistake".


title: Billy Paul

text: On the heels of the Nike suit, Paul targeted his former record company for unpaid royalties on his signature song. He claimed that he had not received an accounting statement from Philadelphia International Records in 27 years and sued Assorted Music, its owners Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, and Sony Music Entertainment for nearly half a million dollars. At the 2003 trial in a federal district court in Los Angeles, Joseph E. Porter, the attorney for Assorted Music, argued that Paul was only owed about $27,000, explaining that while the company had mistakenly failed to collect proper foreign royalties on the record, Paul actually owed the company about $314,000 for the costs of recording and producing the 10 albums he made for Philadelphia International from 1971 to 1980.


title: Billy Paul

text: In the end, the jury deliberated for less than an hour and found that Paul did not owe the company anything. Instead, they awarded him half a million dollars in unpaid royalties for his recording of "Me and Mrs. Jones". Paul said through a statement issued by his attorney: "I'm so glad my path to justice has finally come to an end. I've been waiting years to be paid for my recordings." Seymour Straus, who testified at trial on Paul's behalf commented: "There is no question that Billy Paul's royalties had been improperly calculated for many years." Jay Berger of the Artists Rights Enforcement Corporation said: "This case firmly establishes the rights of singers signed to small production companies to receive 50% of the money earned by the major labels that distribute the records." Chuck Rubin the president of Artists Rights said: "The producers will no longer walk off with any of the artist's royalties." Paul's lawyer Steven Ames Brown commented: "It was a stunning victory for Billy. The jury awarded him $12,000 more than we requested. The years of deception and excuses are over and Billy Paul will from now on enjoy the fruits of his talents. Los Angeles juries have no patience for deadbeat record companies." Brown added: "And Billy Paul was Kenny Gamble's best friend. Can you imagine what might have happened to the others?"


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul's wife and manager Blanche Williams called the decision a "moral victory" and had especially harsh words for Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff: "The jury was...pissed off at the arrogance of G&H, the 'creative bookkeeping' done by Sony, and at discovering how blatantly and systematically Sony and PIR under-reported Billy's earnings... In addition G&H will have to pay us interest on that money going back to '94 (statute of limitations). Oh yes, 'the chickens came home to roost.' Winning this case opens the door for all of those other artists whose royalties were withheld or under-accounted to go to court and seek justice, and to know that they have a good chance of winning their case. This is just the beginning of G&H's worst nightmare. The avalanche cometh."


title: Billy Paul

text: Gamble & Huff's attorney Porter said after the verdict: "It was nothing but an accounting (issue). No one said 'you cheated me.'" Still, Paul's case was an important precedent for other artists including Archie Bell of Archie Bell & the Drells and the O'Jays who also sued Gamble & Huff for unpaid royalties.


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2009, the biographical feature film "Am I Black Enough for You?", directed by Swedish director Göran Hugo Olsson, was released. Awarding the film three stars, "Uncut" magazine said "Olsson modelled his film on "Let’s Get Lost", Bruce Weber’s 1989 portrait of Chet Baker, saying: "Paul is certainly no fallen demi-genius to set alongside Baker, but he proves an engaging, articulate subject, with a story that stretches back to playing alongside Charlie Parker, and peppered with the usual racial prejudice. His career is, in its way, emblematic of black America’s struggles over the last half century, including a descent into cocaine addiction and recovery, both shared with his wife, who remains a quirky, willful presence throughout the movie. The pair come across as a jazzy Derby and Joan."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul explained why he had agreed to work with the filmmakers: "Well I'm not getting any younger and I wanted to express some things that might have been hidden. I wanted to release my heart and tell people about my highs and lows and I think you get that from this documentary... It wasn't difficult to make. We were followed all over the world by this film crew from Europe and I got to be very good friends with the filmmakers. I would say things and do things as if the camera wasn't even there. They approached me about doing this film, and they are real fans. "Am I Black Enough for You?" is very popular in Sweden and these guys really knew their music. They were serious about it, they flew over and followed me and it got real personal...and I trusted them. It's very important like the relationship I have with my wife is based on trust. I wish everyone could have that level in their lives... I am now at peace with myself, I think this movie has done a lot for me because it's helped me get rid of a lot of demons.


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2011, Paul participated in an album by French singer Chimène Badi, recording a duet with her on the Motown song "Ain't No Mountain High Enough".


title: Billy Paul

text: To mark the 40th anniversary of Philadelphia International Records, in 2011 Big Break Records in the UK began remastering and reissuing many of the albums released on PIR, including Paul's works. They included new liner notes, interviews, and bonus tracks. In the U.S., Legacy Recordings issued "Golden Gate Groove: The Sound of Philadelphia Live in San Francisco 1973" – a record company event recorded on June 27, 1973, at the Fairmont Hotel. Paul and other PIR acts were backed by MFSB which featured 35 musicians including Leon Huff on organ. Paul's performances of "East" (10:21) and "Me and Mrs. Jones" (8:34) appear on the album. AllMusic's Andy Kellman gave the release 4.5 out of 5 stars.


title: Billy Paul

text: In addition to receiving the Grammy for "Me and Mrs. Jones", Paul won several Ebby awards given by the readers of "Ebony" magazine; was a recipient of an American Music Award, the NAACP Image Award and numerous proclamations and keys to cities across the United States. Paul received the 2015 AMG Favorite Retro Artist of the Year award, as well as being given the Sandy Hosey Lifetime Achievement Award during the Artists Music Guild's 2015 AMG Heritage Awards broadcast held on November 14, 2015, in Monroe, North Carolina.


title: Billy Paul

text: In 2010 Questlove of the Roots equated Paul with Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder, calling him "one of the criminally unmentioned proprietors of socially conscious post-revolution '60s civil rights music."


title: Billy Paul

text: Paul died on the afternoon of April 24, 2016, at his home in the Blackwood section of Gloucester Township, New Jersey, from pancreatic cancer at the age of 81.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: The Legend of Haolan () is a 2019 Chinese television series starring Wu Jinyan, Mao Zijun and Nie Yuan. It was broadcast on iQiyi from January 19 to March 24, 2019 and was one of the most highly anticipated television dramas of the year.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: Despite the show's good ratings, it failed to live up to the success of 2018's "Story of Yanxi Palace".


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: The series is set during the Warring States period (3rd century BC), and chronicles the rise of Li Haolan to become the Empress Dowager.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: Betrayed by her family and her first love, Li Haolan finds herself in desperate circumstances at the start of the series. Her father, State Censor Li He, arranges marriage between her and the far-older Yu Ping, who treats his other wives brutally. When she tries to circumvent this fate by begging her first love, Prince Jiao, ask to marry her, Li Haolan's stepmother, Gao Min, orders her killed and thrown into the river. Surviving only by chance, Li Haolan crawls back from the brink of death to discover her reputation in tatters, as Gao Min spread the rumor that Li Haolan shamed the family by eloping with a stranger to explain the girl's disappearance. Li Haolan's mother, Wang Wan'er, a lowly concubine, has gone mad with grief over her daughter's unknown fate. Gao Min orders the murder of Li Haolan's mother and sells Li Haolan into slavery, just as Li Haolan watches her sweetheart marrying her little sister, Li Xiuyu.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: Stricken with the knowledge of everyone's complicity, and unable to return home, Li Haolan vows she will never beg for another thing in her life as she tries to claw her way out of her fallen circumstances and avenge the death of her mother and the wrongs done to her. The scheming merchant Lü Buwei purchases Li Haolan and takes interest in the fate of this intelligent, unusual girl. Together, they form an unlikely partnership as they both begin to climb the ladders of power.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: Through Lü Buwei's influence, Li Haolan enters Zhao's imperial court and makes a match with Ying Yiren, the captive prince of Qin. As Qin and Zhao fall into war, the balance of power may find itself upended, with Li Haolan on top.


title: The Legend of Haolan

text: The series was originally slated to have 63 episodes, but the 63rd and final episode was cut due to historical inaccuracies. The new finale is a narrated voiceover at the conclusion of Episode 62.


title: Lake Hillier

text: Lake Hillier is a saline lake on the edge of Middle Island, the largest of the islands and islets that make up the Recherche Archipelago in the Goldfields-Esperance region, off the south coast of Western Australia. It is particularly notable for its pink colour. A long and thin shore divides the Southern Ocean (by some definitions, the Indian Ocean) from the lake.


title: Lake Hillier

text: Lake Hillier is about in length by about in width. The lake is surrounded by a rim of sand and a dense woodland of paperbark and eucalyptus trees with a narrow strip of sand dunes covered by vegetation separating its northern edge from the northern coast of Middle Island. The most notable feature of the lake is its pink, vibrant colour. The vibrant colour is permanent, and does not alter when the water is taken in a container. The pink colour is believed to be due to the presence of the organism, "Dunaliella salina". The Extreme Microbiome Project, part of the Association of Biomolecular Resource Facilities (ABRF), Metagenomics Research Group (MGRG), has performed a metagenomic analysis on the lake to find "Dunaliella" as well as "Salinibacter ruber", "Dechloromonas aromatica", and a few species of the Archaea.


title: Lake Hillier

text: Lake Hillier was visited by the Matthew Flinders expedition on 15 January 1802. Flinders's journal entries are considered to be the first written records of the lake. Flinders observed the pink lake after ascending the island's highest peak (now called Flinders Peak), describing the lake as follows:


title: Lake Hillier

text: Flinders visited Middle Island again in May 1803; he intended "to stop a day or two in Goose-Island Bay, for the purposes of procuring geese for our sick people, seal oil for our lamps, and a few casks of salt from the lake on Middle Island". It is reported that Flinders subsequently named the lake after William Hillier, a crew member of "Investigator" who died of dysentery on 20 May 1803 prior to the expedition's departure from Middle Island.


title: Lake Hillier

text: In 1889, Edward Andrews investigated the commercial possibilities of producing salt from Lake Hillier, and briefly moved onto the island with both of his sons. They left after working the salt deposits for about one year.


title: Lake Hillier

text: The lake was subject to salt mining during the late 19th century. The salt mining enterprise is reported as failing for a number of reasons including "the toxicity of the salt collected for consumption".


title: Lake Hillier

text: The only living organisms in Lake Hillier are microorganisms including "Dunaliella salina", red algae which cause the salt content in the lake to create a red dye which helps produce the colour, as well as red halophilic bacteria, bacterioruberin, present in the salt crusts. Despite the unusual hue, the lake exhibits no known adverse effects upon humans. From above, the lake appears a solid bubble gum pink, but from the shoreline it appears more of a clear pink hue. The shoreline is also covered in salt crust deposits. In 2016 scientists from the Extreme Microbiome Project conducted extensive microbiome and metagenomic DNA sequencing and detected Haloquadratum, Haloferax, Salinibacter, Halobacterium, Halogeometricum, and several other halophilic organisms. Culturing from the water revealed a low concentration of Psychroflexus as well.


title: Lake Hillier

text: Despite the high salt content levels (comparable to those of the Dead Sea), Lake Hillier is safe to swim in. However, it is not advisable nor allowed without previous approval by the Western Australia Dept of Environment Conservation.


title: Lake Hillier

text: There are very few ways to reach Lake Hillier. Aeroplane scenic flights are the most common method, with six flights a day departing Esperance Airport, flying over Lake Hillier via the nearby Cape Le Grand National Park. Cruises are also an option for passengers wanting to visit the isolated lake, and surrounding forest area.


title: Lake Hillier

text: As recently as 2012, Lake Hillier has been located within the boundaries of the Recherche Archipelago Nature Reserve. Since 2002, the lake itself has been considered to be a wetland of "subregional significance".


title: Metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties of England

text: Metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties are one of the four levels of subdivisions of England used for the purposes of local government outside Greater London and the Isles of Scilly. As originally constituted, the metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties each consisted of multiple districts, had a county council and were also the counties for the purposes of Lieutenancies. Later changes in legislation during the 1980s and 1990s have resulted in counties with no county council and 'unitary authority' counties with no districts. Counties for the purposes of Lieutenancies are now defined separately, based on the metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties.


text: In 2009 and 2019, there were further structural changes in some areas, resulting in a total of 83 metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties. These 83 counties collectively consist of 283 districts or district-level subdivisions, i.e. 36 metropolitan boroughs and 247 non-metropolitan districts.


text: The metropolitan counties are Greater Manchester, Merseyside, South Yorkshire, Tyne and Wear, West Midlands and West Yorkshire. The counties typically have populations of 1.2 to 2.8 million.


text: The county councils of these were abolished in 1986, but the counties themselves still exist legally. They are used for some administrative and geographic purposes, and are still ceremonial counties. Most of the powers that the former county councils had were devolved to their metropolitan boroughs, which are now in effect unitary authorities; however, some functions (such as emergency services, civil defence and public transport) are still run jointly on a metropolitan-county-wide basis.


text: The unofficial term "shire county" is sometimes used to refer to a two-tier non-metropolitan county, that is, a non-metropolitan county that has more than one district. Its name does not need to have "shire" in it.


text: Cambridgeshire, Cumbria, Derbyshire, Devon, East Sussex, Essex, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, Lancashire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk, North Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Somerset, Staffordshire, Suffolk, Surrey, Warwickshire, West Sussex, Worcestershire.