Office of Special Investigations (United States Department of Justice)

History.

The case of Braunsteiner-Ryan and the creation of the OSI.

In 1964 it was discovered that Hermine Braunsteiner, a former SS guard in the concentration camps Ravensbrück and Majdanek, was living in the United States. She had met Russel Ryan while he holidayed in Austria & she entered the United States in 1959 shortly after their marriage. The case caused quite a stir and, in consequence, a special working group was set up at the immigration authority, which should identify other war criminals from the Nazi-era, who lived in the United States. This working group was under great public pressure, and was not sufficiently prepared for the task of handling a large number of complex investigations. During 1977–1979, the department initiated five cases, all except one were lost. In the one case won it turned out later that an alleged Gestapo officer was in fact a former forced laborer.  As a consequence, the New York Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman called for the creation of a special unit to prosecute war criminals residing in the United States. In 1979 the Office of Special Investigations was established within the US Department of Justice. Its task consisted of processing the accumulated cases and the resumption of the search for war criminals in the United States. The OSI was equipped with greater powers than any other department. Its employees were able to do all necessary steps themselves, from a first investigation to litigation, negotiating with foreign governments and calling for support of other U.S. authorities.

The work of the OSI.

OSI's work is primarily focused on acts by Nazis abroad before and during World War II, and who subsequently entered, or sought to enter, the United States illegally or fraudulently. It then took the appropriate legal action seeking their exclusion, denaturalization (revocation of U.S. citizenship), and/or deportation.  Even in periods when American-Soviet relations hit their lowest points such as in 1980 the OSI investigators succeeded to conclude agreements with countries of the Warsaw Pact, in order to conduct interviews with witnesses and obtain archival copies. Especially Poland supported the work of the OSI before 1989 by opening its extensive archives. The OSI officials dealt also with cases in which American authorities had collaborated with Nazi war criminals, such as Operation Paperclip. Due to OSI's efforts, the CIA recruitment of Klaus Barbie, the Butcher of Lyon, could be established in 1983 and brought to the public.  However, OSI was not always successful. A low point was the acquittal of Ivan Demjanjuk, wrongfully accused of being "Ivan the Terrible", responsible for crimes in various concentration and extermination camps. The identity of Demjanjuk "Ivan the Terrible" could not be established by the Israeli Supreme Court, who had overtaken the prosecution. Furthermore, the acquisition of documents from the Eastern Bloc countries was only slowly progressing and not very successful. The OSI knew for example already in the early eighties that the former Saugumas chief Aleksandras Lileikis resided in the United States. The archive materials that were made available by the Soviet authorities turned out to be insufficient to press charges.  As of August 2005, OSI had successfully prosecuted 100 persons involved in Nazi war crimes. These persons have been denaturalized and/or been deported from the United States. Many had lived in the U.S. for decades and led unremarkable lives. For example, Adam Friedrich had lived in the U.S. since 1955 and been a citizen since 1962 before OSI found that he had been a member of the SS-Totenkopfverbände assigned as a prison guard at the Gross-Rosen concentration camp. He was denaturalized in 2004 but died in 2006 before he could be deported.  The number of Nazis in the U.S. and world has dwindled rapidly through natural mortality. As such, the mission of the OSI shifted in its last years from focusing strictly on World War II criminals to seeking out and prosecuting war criminals from the conflicts in Bosnia, Serbia, Rwanda, and Darfur who have sought refuge by coming to the United States.

Criticism and controversy.

The OSI received significant criticism throughout its existence from the courts, émigré groups, and others. Criticism has centered on its mandate, perceived influence by Jewish special interest groups, use of evidence from the Soviet Union, and the professional ethics of its leadership.  During the 1980s Cold War years the office was criticized for working with Soviet authorities and submitting evidence provided by them. The majority of OSI prosecutions were against immigrants from the Baltic states and the office was viewed suspiciously by émigré groups from those countries whose members often refused to cooperate in investigations. In 1984, the Veterans of Foreign Wars passed a resolution critical of OSI due to its use of evidence provided by the Soviet Union.  In the 1990s and 2000s the OSI was criticized for having "outlived its usefulness." No significant Nazi persecutor had been prosecuted in decades and the ongoing investigations were against elderly men and women who had served as guards or members of auxiliary police units. In 1997 a Holocaust survivor and potential witness wrote to the OSI to say, "[it was now] too long a period for effective implementation of sanctions against these individuals...Men's action in the service of Justice after 50 years must necessarily be feeble at this stage. Accordingly, I respectfully suggest that your formidable resources and energies be used for more current causes, where they can do some good."

Criticisms by Federal judiciary of the United States.

OSI's first case was "Fedorenko v. United States" in which the Supreme Court ruled 7–2 that a person who had assisted the enemy in persecuting civilians could have his citizenship revoked. In his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens "accused his colleagues of reacting to the horrors of Treblinka rather than following the logic of the law". The trial judge referred to the defendant as "a hard-working and responsible American citizen" and criticized the government for filing the denaturalization action in the first place and "squandering taxpayer funds". Fedorenko was deported to the Soviet Union and later executed. The OSI was aware he faced execution and was advised by the State Department to relay that information to him but refused to do so.  OSI's most notorious prosecution was that of John Demjanjuk who was accused of being "Ivan the Terrible", the gas chamber operator at Treblinka. He was brought to the government's attention in 1975 by a Soviet reporter based in New York and extradited to Israel in 1986 where he was convicted but later freed based on new evidence. It emerged during his trial that OSI attorneys had withheld evidence from his defense team. A three-judge panel from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that the OSI attorneys had not met to their "obligation to work for justice" and "concluded that OSI had perpetrated a fraud on the court".

Conduit for Jewish special interest groups.

Stemming from OSI's conduct in the Demjanjuk case, the Sixth Circuit unanimously criticized the office for "having a mindset that required it to try to please and maintain very close relationships with various interest groups because their continued existence depended upon it". In 1994, the Chief Judge of the Sixth Circuit, Gilbert S. Merritt, Jr., wrote to Attorney General Janet Reno that "it appeared that outside pressure on the Department from 'Jewish special interest groups' had 'obviously influenced...the OSI'."

Criticism of OSI directors.

Walter Rockler was the first director of OSI. Allan Ryan was the second, serving from 1980 to 1983. He was named in part because United States Department of Justice (DOJ) leadership sought a non-Jewish director, as they did not want the office to be seen as a "Jewish organization". A Special Master was appointed by the sixth circuit to investigate the OSI's handling of the Demjanjuk case under Ryan and defense allegations of withholding evidence; the report remains unpublished. Neal Sher served as the third OSI director, serving from 1983 to 1994. His departure from OSI to head the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) was seen as indicative of the influence of Jewish special interest groups on the office. Sher left AIPAC for the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims but resigned after allegations he had misappropriated $136,000. He was disbarred in 2003.

Organization.

The last Director of OSI was Eli Rosenbaum, who had worked for the office on and off since 1980. He was appointed Director of the office in 1995 after having served as its Principal Deputy Director since 1988. Rosenbaum is now the Director of Strategy and Policy for the new Human Rights and Special Prosecution Section.  People investigated by the OSI  Similar organizations  http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB331/index.htm

The Office of Special Investigations is a unit within the Criminal Division of the United States Department of Justice. Its purpose is to detect and investigate individuals who took part in state sponsored acts committed in violation of public international law, such as crimes against humanity.


Life.

Early years.

Inge Lange was born into a politically conscious family in Leipzig, as Ingeburg Rosch. Her father was (1899-1945), a Communist Party activist. While she was still a young child, the reality of post-democratic Germany came to her home when her father was arrested for transporting illegal (political) books and, for a period, imprisoned in 1935/36. Ingeburg secured a training as a dressmaker between 1943 and 1946. In 1945 she became a member of Antifascist youth in the quarter of Leipzig.

Politics.

In 1945 she joined the Communist Party (KPD). Following the forced merger, in what was becoming the German Democratic Republic, of the KPD and the SPD (party), this left her, in 1946, as a member of the newly formed Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED / "Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands"). Specifically, between 1946 and 1961 Lange had a succession of positions within the ruling SED party's youth wing, the Free German Youth ( FDJ / " Freie Deutsche Jugend").

Teaching and youth work.

She undertook a teacher training course in 1946/47 after which she became an assistant at the Antifascist School at Königs Wusterhausen. In 1947 she became a teacher at the North-west Youth School in Mutzschen. Between 1947 and 1949 she was Secretary, and then in 1950 First Secretary with the regional Free German Youth organisation at Wismut SAG, the tightly controlled (on behalf of the Soviets) and strategically critical uranium mining operation near the Czechoslovak border.

National politics.

Between 1948 and 1950 Lange belonged to the Wusmut region leadership of the country's ruling SED party and was a member of its secretariat. In 1950/51 she served as Second Secretary of the FDJ executive for the greater Berlin region. From May 1952 till December 1961 she worked as the Secretary to the Central Council of the FDJ.  Between September 1951 and July 1952 she studied at the Komsomol Lenin Academy in Moscow, which can be seen as a mark of appreciation from Moscow for a difficult job well done during her time at Wismut. Between 1955 and 1961 she undertook a correspondence course at the prestigious Karl Marx Academy, which led her to a degree in Social sciences.

Abortion law.

In August 1961 Ingeburg Lange succeeded Edith Baumann and as head of the Party Central Committee working group and department concerned with women. In the Women Commission set up by Walter Ulbricht controversy was generated by the theme of women's ability to take decisions for themselves regarding their bodies. This in effect was the so-called abortion debate that was also a political theme in western politics at the time, but underpinned in East Germany by a desperate labour shortage caused by the scale of male deaths in the war and compounded by the massive emigration of working age citizens from East to West Germany in the decade before the inner German border was fortified. The East German abortion law was eventually passed on 9 Match 1972. Unusually for East Germany, the parliamentary vote was not unanimous 14 members voted against the new law which for the first time gave women the right, during the first twelve weeks of a pregnancy, to choose to have an abortion. Another aspect of the legislation was free distribution of the contraceptive pill. There were those who opposed 1972 Abortion legislation both in the medical profession and in the churches. Although the legislation is generally seen as Inge Lange's achievement, it would not have come about without powerful support from other influential members of the East German political elite, notably Margot Honecker whose husband took over as the East German national leader a year or so before the law was passed.

Further political promotions and appointments.

She sat as a member of the National legislature "(Volkskammer)" from 1952 till 1954 and then from 1963 till 1989. Between 1963 and 1967 she was a member of the assembly's committee for Industry, Construction and Traffic, and from 1971 deputy chair of the Committee for Work and Social policy.  In 1963 Lange was nominated as a candidate for membership of The Party central Committee. Progression from Central Committee candidature to membership often took many years, but Inge Lange progressed to Central Committee membership rapidly, being appointed in early December 1964.  With the German Democratic Republic collapsing, on 8 November she resigned from the Central Committee of the party's politburo, but she was then selected as a candidate for the replacement politburo. The entire central committee then resigned on 3 December 1989. On 21 January 1990 she was one of those expelled from The Party, which was now in the process of mutating into the PDS (Party of Democratic Socialism). After this she withdrew from public life.

Death.

Inge Lange died in a Berlin hospital on 13 July 2013.

Daughter.

Inge Lange's daughter is the prize-winning novelist Katja Lange-Müller.

Ingeburg "Inge" Lange (24 July 1927 – 13 July 2013) was an East German politician. Along with Margarete Müller and Margot Honecker she was one of a small number of women to reach the higher ranks in the country's power structure. She was the leader of the Women Department of the Central Committee of the country's ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED / "Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands"). She played a central role in liberalising East German Abortion laws.


History.

The invention of the pedal radio by Alfred Traeger around 1929, and particularly the involvement of educator Adelaide Miethke in formulating and developing the idea of using the existing Royal Flying Doctor Service of radio communications, were pivotal in the establishment of the School of the Air.  The first School of the Air lessons were officially sent from the Royal Flying Doctor Service in Alice Springs on 8 June 1951. The service celebrated its 50th jubilee on 9 May 2001, ahead of the real jubilee on 8 June. Each state of Australia that utilizes this means of training has well-documented checks and overviews of the service.

Method.

There are School of the Air programmes in all states except Tasmania.  School classes were conducted via shortwave radio from 2003 until 2009, after which most schools switched to wireless internet technologies to deliver lessons that include live one-way video feeds and clear two-way audio.  Each student has direct contact with a teacher in an inland town such as Broken Hill, Alice Springs or Meekatharra. Each student typically spends one hour per day receiving group or individual lessons from the teacher, and the rest of the day working through the assigned materials with a parent, older sibling or a hired home-stay tutor.  Traditionally, the students received their course materials and returned their written work and projects to their hub centre using either the Royal Flying Doctor Service or post office services. However the extension of Internet services into the outback now enables more rapid review of each child's homework.  As the children are in isolated situations, the School of the Air is frequently their first chance of socialisation with children outside their immediate family. This is supplemented by 3 or 4 annual gatherings where the children travel to the school to spend one week with their teacher and classmates.  Studies have shown that such education has a parity with, if not better, standards than traditional methods of schooling.

Awards.

In 2009 as part of the Q150 celebrations, the School of the Air was announced as one of the Q150 Icons of Queensland for its role as an iconic "innovation and invention".

Schools of the Air.

Schools of the Air operate from:

School of the Air is a generic term for correspondence schools catering for the primary and early secondary education of children in remote and outback Australia where some or all classes were traditionally conducted by radio, although this is now replaced by telephone and internet technology. In these areas, the school-age population is too small for a conventional school to be viable.


Constrained optimization.

In constrained optimization in economics, the shadow price is the change, per infinitesimal unit of the constraint, in the optimal value of the objective function of an optimization problem obtained by relaxing the constraint. If the objective function is utility, it is the marginal utility of relaxing the constraint. If the objective function is cost, it is the marginal cost of strengthening the constraint. In a business application, a shadow price is the maximum price that management is willing to pay for an extra unit of a given limited resource. For example, if a production line is already operating at its maximum 40-hour limit, the shadow price would be the maximum price the manager would be willing to pay for operating it for an additional hour, based on the benefits he would get from this change.  In advance of adequate regulation or market pricing for some commodity items, conservative organizations will place on their balance sheets a value they believe to be an accurate reflection of the value of those items to their operations. This is common for companies with a large carbon footprint or water footprint. As an example Microsoft has placed a $27/ton price on its carbon emissions which is then billed to the P&L of its individual business units and used to fund the company's renewable energy and efficiency programs.  More formally, the shadow price is the value of the Lagrange multiplier at the optimal solution, which means that it is the infinitesimal change in the objective function arising from an infinitesimal change in the constraint. This follows from the fact that at the optimal solution the gradient of the objective function is a linear combination of the constraint function gradients with the weights equal to the Lagrange multipliers. Each constraint in an optimization problem has a shadow price or dual variable.

Cost-benefit analysis.

Shadow pricing is frequently used to figure out the monetary values of intangibles and hard to quantify factors during cost-benefit analyses. In the context of public economics, shadow pricing is very useful for governments and policymakers to evaluate whether a public project should be pursued. This is because public goods are very rarely exchanged in the market, making it difficult to determine its price. To help determine the monetary value of these goods, these three tools are often used. Take the example of a government determining whether it wants to undertake a freeway project that would save commuters 500,000 hours a year, save 5 lives a year, and reduce air pollution due to decreased congestion but with a present value cost of $250 million.

Contingent valuation.

Contingent valuation estimates the value a person places on a good by asking him or her directly. It is essentially surveys for individuals on how much they would be willing to pay for some intangible benefits or to avoid some intangible harms. Typically, these surveys contain detailed descriptions of hypothetical public goods or services, ask respondents how much they would pay for it, and collect relevant demographic data of these respondents. Some common types of these survey questions include: open-ended, referendum-type, payment-card type, and double-bounded referendum-type.  The advantage of contingent valuation is that it is sometimes the only feasible method for valuing a public good. This is especially the case when there is no obvious market price that one can use to determine the value. On the other hand, there are also many disadvantages of this method. For instance, how the survey is structured and how the questions are framed can lead to widely varying results and can induce bias into the results. Other times, the respondents may simply have no idea how much they value the public good in question.  In the freeway project example, policymakers can design a survey that asks respondents on how much they would pay to save a certain period of time or to spend less time in traffic. However, respondents may find it difficult or uncomfortable to put a value on a life.

Revealed preferences.

Revealed preferences are based on observations on real world behaviors to determine how much individuals place on non-monetary outcomes. In other words, observing individuals' purchasing behaviors is the best way to determine their preferences. It assumes that individuals have made their purchasing decisions over other alternatives – making their final purchases the preferred one. It also allows room for the preferred choice to vary depending on the prices and the budgetary constraints. As such, by varying prices and budgetary constraints, a schedule can be created of an individual's/individuals' preferred choices under certain prices and constraints.  The advantage of revealed preferences is that it reduces biases that contingent valuation may bring. As it is based on real-world behaviors, it is much harder for individuals to manipulate or guess-work their answers. On the other hand, this tool also has its limits. For example, it is difficult to control for other factors that may make one prefer a choice over another. It also fails to fully incorporate indifference between two equally preferred choices.  In the freeway project example, where contingent valuation may fall short in determining how much individuals value lives, revealed preferences may be better suited. For instance, policymakers can look at how much more individuals need to be paid to take on riskier jobs that increase the probability of fatality. However, the drawbacks with revealed preferences also arise – in this case, if the riskier jobs increase the probability of not only death but also injury, or are also unpleasant in other respects, the higher wages may incorporate the other factors, misrepresenting the result.

Hedonic pricing.

Hedonic pricing is a model that uses regression analysis to isolate the value of a specific intangible cost or benefit. It is based on the premise that that price is determined by both internal characteristics and external factors. It also assumes that individuals value the characteristics of a good rather than the good itself, which implies that price will reflect a set of internal and external characteristics. It is most often used to calculate variances in housing prices that reflect the value of local environmental factors. The model is based on widely-available and relatively accurate market data, making this method uncontroversial and inexpensive to use.  As such, one of hedonic pricing's main advantages is that it can be used to estimate values on actual choices. This method is also very versatile and can be adapted to incorporate multiple other interactions with other factors. However, one of its major downfalls is that it is rather limited – it can mostly only measure things that are related to housing prices. It also assumes that individuals have the freedom and power to select the preferred combination given their income but in actuality, this may not be the case as the market may be influenced by changes in taxes and interest rates.  In the freeway project example, hedonic pricing may be useful to value the benefits of reduced air pollution. It can run a regression of home values on clean air with a variety of control variables that can include home size, age of home, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, crime statistics, school qualities, etc. Hedonic pricing may also be considered in quantifying the monetary value of time saved. It can run a regression of home values on proximity to work with a similar set of control variables.

Illustration #1.

Suppose a consumer with utility function formula_1 faces prices formula_2 and is endowed with income formula_3 Then the consumer's problem is:  Forming the Lagrangian auxiliary function formula_5 taking first-order conditions and solving for its saddle point we obtain formula_6 which satisfy  This gives us a clear interpretation of the Lagrange multiplier in the context of consumer maximization. If the consumer is given an extra unit of income (the budget constraint is relaxed) at the optimal consumption level where the marginal utility per unit of income for each good is equal to formula_8 as above, then the change in maximal utility per unit of additional income will be equal to formula_8 since at the optimum the consumer gets the same amount of marginal utility per unit of income from spending his additional income on either good.

Illustration #2.

Holding prices fixed, if we define the indirect utility function as then we have the identity where formula_12 are the demand functions, i.e. formula_13  Now define the optimal expenditure function  Assume differentiability and that formula_15 is the solution at formula_16, then we have from the multivariate chain rule: Now we may conclude that This again gives the obvious interpretation, one extra unit of optimal expenditure will lead to formula_8 units of optimal utility.

Control theory.

In optimal control theory, the concept of shadow price is reformulated as costate equations, and one solves the problem by minimization of the associated Hamiltonian via Pontryagin's minimum principle.

A shadow price is a monetary value assigned to currently unknowable or difficult-to-calculate costs in the absence of correct market prices. It is based on the willingness to pay principle – the most accurate measure of the value of a good or service is what people are willing to give up in order to get it. A shadow price is often calculated based on certain assumptions, and so it is subjective and somewhat inaccurate.


Biography.

Paryla was born to working-class parents; his father was an instrument maker, and a lower officer and civil servant in the administration of Austria-Hungary. Born Catholic, he dropped his religious affiliation in 1922. He trained at the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna, and began a career as an actor with the Raimund Theater in Vienna (some of his siblings, including Emil Stöhr, also had theatrical careers) in 1924 and by 1926 was working in theaters in Germany, where he also became involved with communist workers' organizations. He was fired in Darmstadt in 1933 for political reasons and fled to Vienna, where he found work with the Theater in der Josefstadt. After the Anschluss he emigrated to Switzerland.

During World War II.

In Zurich, he contributed to the reputation of the Schauspielhaus Zürich as an anti-fascist exile theater, performing in original productions and stagings of classical plays, and he played a central part in the development of realistic drama based on the work of Constantin Stanislavski. He had over 90 roles at the Schauspielhaus, performing in classical tragedy (the titular character in "Oedipus Rex") and comedy (Orgon in "Tartuffe"). He worked with Bertolt Brecht and played the role of Schweizerkas in the first performance of Brecht's "Mother Courage and Her Children". After World War II ended he was one of the first actors to return to Vienna, in December 1945.

After World War II.

With Wolfgang Heinz and Emil Stöhr, Paryla was a founding member, from 1948 to 1956, of the "Neue Theater in der Scala", a "workers' theatre" financially supported by the Communist Party of Austria. The theater aimed to be a working man's group with a focus on the work of Austrian dramatist Johann Nestroy, on political drama, and on comedy, an unfavorable mix during the Cold War.  While Vienna was still divided between the West and the Soviet Union, he also worked in cinema, at the Rosenhügel Filmstudios. When the Soviets left Austria in 1955, he was blacklisted with many others who had worked for Rosenhügel. In 1952 already he had been prevented by American pressure from participating in the Salzburg Festival, where he was an annual regular; Paryla was supposed to have performed in "Jedermann". Like many blacklisted actors and directors, he went to work in East Germany and began making movies for DEFA; his first was "Mich dürstet", a film based on the Spanish Civil War. At the same time he continued to perform, in Berlin and Munich, with notable roles including Touchstone ("As You Like It") and Mephistopheles ("Faust"), and above all as a Netroy actor. In 1966, he performed in Cologne in an adaptation of "La Celestina". He died on 14 July 1996 in his native city, Vienna.

Legacy.

Paryla was praised for his realism in acting, especially in Johann Nestroy's plays, and as a director for his dynamic mise-en-scene. Paryla is credited as one of the actors that made the Schauspielhaus Zürich "the best theatre in Europe". He was one of the contributors to the "Nestroy Renaissance in Vienna"; under German occupation Nestroy was deemed "folkish" and German enough to be allowed on stage, and after the war Paryla was one of the actors/directors who reclaimed Nestroy—this time, with a communist agenda (according to one critic), with Paryla stressing realism: "In our theater we play Nestroy in unadulterated form, that is forcefully; that also means that we do not permit false sentimentality or false compromise. We consider the production of each Nestroy comedy as the most honorable and most natural duty. And that is why we play Nestroy." He is praised as lending a political realism to Nestrovian characters unparalleled in the 1950s.  Paryla's relationship with Vienna was strained because of politics; official recognition from the city would not come until the 1980s and 90s.

Personal life.

He was married to the German-born stage and film actress Hortense Raky from 1939 until his death.

Karl Paryla (1905–1996) was an Austrian theater actor and director, and later a film maker as well. A lifelong, dedicated communist, his career in the Austrian theater was first interrupted by the Second World War, and then strained by Cold War politics. In the 1950s he began working in East Germany, where he performed as an actor and directed plays and films. An actor trained in the school of Constantin Stanislavski, he is praised for the realism he brought to his performances especially in Johann Nestroy's plays and for his ability to organize large ensembles dynamically on the stage. He is remembered also for his work ethic and his fervent belief in the emancipatory power of the theater.


History.

Following allegations brought by the Communist Party and ousted reform-oriented liberal parties such as the Union of Right Forces and Yabloko that President Vladimir Putin's United Russia had manipulated elections to ensure a favorable outcome, Rodina declined to field its own candidate in the 2004 presidential elections. This created a schism within Rodina as Sergey Glazyev insisted on running for President under the banner of an officially separate Rodina party, but Dmitry Rogozin was able to consolidate his support and defeat Glazyev.  In the aftermath of the 2003 legislative elections, the party mostly supported the policies of President Putin. However, four Rodina deputies, including Dmitry Rogozin, went on a public hunger strike and locked themselves in their offices at the State Duma to protest the welfare reforms being pushed through by Putin's government in February 2005. The bloc since increasingly adopted the slogan "Za Putina, Protiv Pravitel'stva" ("For Putin, Against the Government") and stated that its immediate goal was to win a parliamentary majority in the 2007 legislative elections.  On 27 January 2005, nineteen members of the State Duma, including members of Rodina and the Communist Party, signed a petition to the prosecutor-general demanding that Jewish organisations be banned in the Russian Federation. This caused a political scandal, with then-President Putin (who was participating in commemorations for the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz on the day that the petition was issued) expressing shame over the petition's content and the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews issuing a statement roundly criticising the petition and its signers. The prosecutor-general in a later investigation declined to charge the signatories of the petition with fomenting racial hatred. In July 2005, the party's co-leader Sergey Baburin left the bloc, taking nine Duma deputies with him and forming an alternative group in the State Duma, which also calls itself Motherland. The split led to a reunification of Dmitry Rogozin's and Sergey Glazyev's supporters. Rogozin accused the Kremlin of waging a dirty war against his bloc, which he claims is feared by the United Russia party because of its potential electoral support. Rogozin had also announced intentions to take legal action against the State Duma for allowing Baburin to register his bloc in the Duma as Motherland, creating a potential for confusion within the electorate.  On 6 November 2005, Rodina was barred from taking part in the December elections to the Moscow Duma following a complaint filed by the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia that Rodina's advertising campaign incited racial hatred. The advertisement in question showed Caucasian immigrants tossing watermelon rinds to the ground and ended with the slogan "Let's clear our city of trash". It garnered much controversy and opinion polls predicted that Rodina would come second with close to 25% in the December vote. Rogozin appealed the decision, but the ban was upheld on 1 December 2005.  Rodina's difficulties continued into 2006, when it failed to obtain permission to contest local elections in a number of regions. However, the party did come third in the regional elections in Altai Republic. Rogozin unexpectedly stepped down as party leader in March 2006 and was replaced by the less known businessman Alexander Babakov. Many suspected this was a tactical decision on Rodina's part to ease pressure from the Kremlin, although a small number of party members in Moscow had been vocal in their criticism of Rogozin's more outlandish nationalist rhetoric. On 28 October 2006, Rodina merged with the Russian Party of Life and the Russian Pensioners' Party into a new party called A Just Russia. Many of Rodina's parliamentary faction joined the new party, except for Rogozin, Andrey Savelyev and Glazyev, who at present does not belong to any party. In 2007, Rogozin was appointed Russian Ambassador to NATO.  Rodina was reinstated on 29 September 2012 and Aleksey Zhuravlyov, formally a member of the ruling United Russia, was unanimously voted to lead the party.

Party name.

The term "rodina" (Russian: "родина") means "motherland". It is one of three words in the Russian language that express the concept of "native land". "Otechestvo" (отечество) and "оtchizna" (oтчизна) both translate into English as "fatherland" and "relate to the country in which one is a citizen". "Rodina" means one's birthplace and is identified with the nation's soul.

Electoral results.

Legislative elections.

In July 2017, the chairman of Rodina announced that the only candidate whom the party will support is current President Vladimir Putin for the 2018 presidential election.

Rodina or Motherland-National Patriotic Union () is a nationalist political party in Russia. It was a coalition of thirty nationalist groups that was established by Dmitry Rogozin, Sergey Glazyev, Sergey Baburin, Viktor Gerashchenko, Georgy Shpak, Valentin Varennikov and others in August 2003. The party's ideology combined "patriotism, nationalism, and a greater role for the government in the economy" and is described as "far-right". It was banned in 2005–6 from taking part in some elections after complaints that its advertisements incited racial hatred. The most notorious showed people eating watermelon and throwing the rinds to the ground, then called for Russians to clean their cities of rubbish. Its headquarters were located in Moscow.


Symbolism of the rose.

In the Latin West the symbolism of the rose is of Greco-Roman heritage but influenced by and finally transformed through Latin biblical and liturgical texts. In Greco-Roman culture the rose's symbolic qualities represented beauty, the season of spring, and love. It also spoke of the fleetness of life, and therefore of death. In Rome the feast called "Rosalia" was a feast of the dead: thus the flower referred to the next world.  This symbolism attained a deeper complexity when contrasted with the rose's thorns. This contrast inspired the Christian Latin poet Coelius Sedulius, who wrote (between 430-450) a very elaborate comparison between Eve, our first mother, and Mary, the Mother of Jesus our Savior. He illustrated the parallelism already made by Justin Martyr (around 150) and developed it in a deep poetic and doctrinal liturgical teaching in his Easter song, "Carmen paschal".  The rose was a privileged symbol for Mary, Queen of heaven and earth. One of her titles in Catholic Marian devotion is Rosa Mystica or Mystic Rose. During the Middle Ages, the rose became an attribute of many other holy women, including Elizabeth of Hungary, Elizabeth of Portugal and Casilda of Toledo, and of martyrs in general. The rose is even a symbol for Christ himself, as seen in the German Christmas song, "es ist ein 'Rose' entsprungen."  During the Middle Ages the rose was cultivated in monastery gardens and used for medicinal purposes. It became a symbol in religious writing and iconography in different images and settings, to invoke a variety of intellectual and emotional responses. The mystic rose appears in Dante's "Divine Comedy", where it represents God's love. By the twelfth century, the red rose had come to represent Christ's passion, and the blood of the martyrs.  The most common association of the rose is with the Virgin Mary. The third-century Saint Ambrose believed that there were roses in the Garden of Eden, initially without thorns, but which became thorny after the fall, and came to symbolize Original Sin itself. Thus the Blessed Virgin is often referred to as the 'rose without thorns', since she was immaculately conceived. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux compared her virginity to a white rose and her charity to a red rose. With the rise of Marian devotion and the Gothic cathedral in the twelfth century, the image of the rose became even more prominent in religious life. Cathedrals built around this time usually include a rose window, dedicated to the Virgin, at the end of a transept or above the entrance. The thirteenth century Saint Dominic is credited with the institution of the Rosary, a series of prayers to the Virgin, symbolized by garlands of roses worn in Heaven.

Saint Elizabeth of Hungary.

In Western Europe, the best-known version of a miracle of the roses concerns Saint Elizabeth of Hungary (also called Elisabeth of Thuringia), the daughter of King Andrew II of Hungary, who spent most of her life living with her in-laws in Germany (a ruling family of Thuringia), who kept court at Wartburg Castle.

Origins.

It has been suggested that the legend originated in a sermon given by Caesarius of Heisterbach in which he reflects on the occasion of the translation of the remains of Saint Elizabeth, in 1236. Caesarius speaks of a sweet aroma that emanates from the grave as soon as it is opened (a common theme in hagiography). This metaphorical or actual aroma could have been translated into a physical event, the miracle of the roses. The first report of a miracle resembling that of the roses is by Franciscans in the mid-13th century. Their account is of spring flowers, and the event takes place in Hungary, at Elizabeth's home when she was five years old. The miracle as we know it, with roses and in Germany, is first reported in 1332, in a Franciscan book of prayers, though it has also been proposed that the miracle was "translated" from Elizabeth of Portugal to Elisabeth of Hungary in the 19th century.

The legend.

In its most characteristic form the legend goes as follows. One day the young but pious Elizabeth, in the company of one or more serving women, descends from Wartburg Castle down to the village of Eisenach, below the castle. She is carrying meat, eggs, and bread under her mantle. Supposedly she has taken items from the family dining table to distribute to the poor in the village, against the wishes of her family, who frown upon such behavior. Halfway down, she unexpectedly meets her husband Ludwig IV of Thuringia, who asks, upon seeing her bulk, what she is carrying. Embarrassed and speechless as she is, she does not know what to say. Ludwig opens her mantle, and to his surprise (in some versions this takes place in the dead of winter) finds her carrying a bouquet of roses.

Similar versions.

Saint Elizabeth of Portugal.

Very much the same story is told of Elizabeth of Portugal, also known as Elizabeth of Aragon (1271–4 July 1336), who was the great-niece of Elizabeth of Hungary. Married to the profligate King Denis of Portugal, she, like her great-aunt, showed great devotion at an early age, and likewise was charitable toward the poor, against the wishes of her husband. Caught one day by her husband, while carrying bread in her apron, the food was turned into roses. Since this occurred in January, King Denis reportedly had no response and let his wife continue. The story is somewhat apocryphal; while it shows up in popular versions of the saint's life, the account is missing from more authoritative sources such as the revised 1991 edition of Alban Butler's "Lives of the Saints".

Saint Casilda of Toledo.

Similar also is the legend of Casilda of Toledo (died c. 1050), a daughter of a Muslim king of Toledo, Spain during the rule of the Caliphate, who showed special kindness to Christian prisoners. She would carry bread hidden in her clothes to feed these prisoners; one day, when caught, the bread was miraculously changed into roses. In the famous painting of Saint Casilda by the 17th-century painter Francisco Zurbarán, roses are visible in the saint's lap; the miracle is also depicted in a painting by the 19th-century painter Jose Nogales. But while Saint Casilda supposedly died in the 11th century, predating the birth of both Elizabeth of Hungary and Elizabeth of Portugal, her hagiography was not written until three centuries after her death, and is likely influenced by the legend of one of these Elizabeths.

Saint Didacus of Alcalá.

Of the 15th-century Franciscan St. Didacus of Alcalá, also known as San Diego, the same miracle is told: as a lay brother of the Franciscans in Spain, he often took bread from the monastery's dining table to give to the poor. One day, leaving the convent with a cloak full of food, he was accused and challenged to open his cloak; miraculously, the loaves of bread had changed into roses.

Our Lady of Guadalupe.

The story of Our Lady of Guadalupe is of an entirely different character, although here again the miraculous presence of the roses in the middle of winter is a sign of the presence of the divinity. The account is a corollary to a Marian apparition, Our Lady of Guadalupe, found in the 1556 booklet Nican Mopohua, and supposedly taking place in 1531. It concerns a native inhabitant of Mexico named Juan Diego, whom the Virgin chooses to convey a message to an unwilling bishop, that "Here I will hear their weeping, their sorrow and will remedy and alleviate all their multiple sufferings, necessities and misfortunes." The bishop however, does not believe Diego's story. He returns to his field, where again the Virgin appears to him, with the same message. Diego again goes to the bishop, with the same result, and the remark that he has to bring a token if he is to be believed. The fourth time the Virgin appears, she directs Diego toward "varied Castilian flowers" which he picks; she then places the flowers in his mantle. (The identification of these flowers as Castilian roses or Damask roses, is a later addition.) This time the bishop is convinced, especially when an image of the Virgin miraculously appears on Diego's cloak.

St. Rita of Cascia.

A miracle involving roses occurred to Saint Rita of Cascia. The winter before the end of her life, a cousin visited her and asked her if she desired anything from her old home at Roccaporena. Saint Rita responded by asking for a rose and a fig from the garden. It was January and her cousin did not expect to find anything due to the snowy weather. However, when her relative went to the house, a single blooming rose was found in the garden, as well as a fully ripened and edible fig. Her cousin brought the rose and fig back to Saint Rita at the convent, who thanked her and gave the rose to her sisters.  The rose is thought to represent God's love for Rita and Rita's ability to intercede on behalf of lost causes or impossible cases. Rita is often depicted holding roses or with roses nearby, and on her feast day, churches and shrines of Saint Rita provide roses to the congregation that are blessed by priests during Mass.

Statement of Pope John Paul II.

On the occasion of the centenary of the canonization of Saint Rita of Cascia, Pope John Paul II stated that the worldwide devotion to Saint Rita is symbolized by the rose, and said: "It is to be hoped that the life of everyone devoted to her will be like the rose picked in the garden of Roccaporena the winter before the saint's death. That is, let it be a life sustained by passionate love for the Lord Jesus; a life capable of responding to suffering and to thorns with forgiveness and the total gift of self, in order to spread everywhere the good odour of Christ (cf. ) through a consistently lived proclamation of the Gospel." He added that Saint Rita spiritually offers her rose to each of those he addressed as an exhortation to "live as witnesses to a hope that never disappoints and as missionaries of a life that conquers death".

Saint Faustyna Kowalska.

In her "", Saint Faustyna Kowalska writes of potatoes converting into roses:

Critical theme in Heinrich Böll novel.

The 1971 novel "Group Portrait with Lady" () by Nobel Prize winning author Heinrich Böll - who had grown up in a Catholic environment - includes many passages taking up Catholic themes, in a way highly critical of the Church. One of the book's themes concerns a nun who had been born a Jew, became a heretical Catholic, and died during the war under questionable circumstances, while under custody of the Church authorities who were supposed to protect her from the Nazis. In the book's present during the 1960s, there happens a manifest Miracle of the Roses, with red roses growing again and again in mid-winter from the nun's ashes. However, the Church authorities persistently refuse to take notice of this miracle, which would have obliged them to consider canonizing her, since that would have required a recognition that the Church had wronged her and caused her death.

A miracle of the roses is a miracle in which roses manifest an activity of God or of a saint. Such a miracle is presented in various hagiographies and legends in different forms, and it occurs in connection with diverse individuals such as Saints Elizabeth of Hungary (1207–1231), Elizabeth of Portugal (1271–1336), St. Dorothy, a 4th-century virgin martyr at Caesarea in Cappadocia (died ca. 311), and Our Lady of Guadalupe (appeared in 1531).


History.

used Hecke operators on modular forms in a paper on the special cusp form of Ramanujan, ahead of the general theory given by. Mordell proved that the Ramanujan tau function, expressing the coefficients of the Ramanujan form,  is a multiplicative function:  The idea goes back to earlier work of Adolf Hurwitz, who treated algebraic correspondences between modular curves which realise some individual Hecke operators.

Mathematical description.

Hecke operators can be realized in a number of contexts. The simplest meaning is combinatorial, namely as taking for a given integer "n" some function "f"(Λ) defined on the lattices of fixed rank to  with the sum taken over all the Λ′ that are subgroups of Λ of index "n". For example, with "n=2" and two dimensions, there are three such Λ′. Modular forms are particular kinds of functions of a lattice, subject to conditions making them analytic functions and homogeneous with respect to homotheties, as well as moderate growth at infinity; these conditions are preserved by the summation, and so Hecke operators preserve the space of modular forms of a given weight.  Another way to express Hecke operators is by means of double cosets in the modular group. In the contemporary adelic approach, this translates to double cosets with respect to some compact subgroups.

Explicit formula.

Let "M" be the set of 2×2 integral matrices with determinant "m" and "Γ" = "M" be the full modular group "SL"(2, Z). Given a modular form "f"("z") of weight "k", the "m"th Hecke operator acts by the formula  where "z" is in the upper half-plane and the normalization constant "m" assures that the image of a form with integer Fourier coefficients has integer Fourier coefficients. This can be rewritten in the form  which leads to the formula for the Fourier coefficients of "T"("f"("z")) = ∑ "b""q" in terms of the Fourier coefficients of "f"("z") = ∑ "a""q":  One can see from this explicit formula that Hecke operators with different indices commute and that if "a" = 0 then "b" = 0, so the subspace "S" of cusp forms of weight "k" is preserved by the Hecke operators. If a (non-zero) cusp form "f" is a simultaneous eigenform of all Hecke operators "T" with eigenvalues "λ" then "a" = "λ""a" and "a" ≠ 0. Hecke eigenforms are normalized so that "a" = 1, then  Thus for normalized cuspidal Hecke eigenforms of integer weight, their Fourier coefficients coincide with their Hecke eigenvalues.

Hecke algebras.

Algebras of Hecke operators are called "Hecke algebras", and are commutative rings. In the classical elliptic modular form theory, the Hecke operators "T" with "n" coprime to the level acting on the space of cusp forms of a given weight are self-adjoint with respect to the Petersson inner product. Therefore, the spectral theorem implies that there is a basis of modular forms that are eigenfunctions for these Hecke operators. Each of these basic forms possesses an Euler product. More precisely, its Mellin transform is the Dirichlet series that has Euler products with the local factor for each prime "p" is the inverse of the Hecke polynomial, a quadratic polynomial in "p". In the case treated by Mordell, the space of cusp forms of weight 12 with respect to the full modular group is one-dimensional. It follows that the Ramanujan form has an Euler product and establishes the multiplicativity of "τ"("n").  Other related mathematical rings are also called "Hecke algebras", although sometimes the link to Hecke operators is not entirely obvious. These algebras include certain quotients of the group algebras of braid groups. The presence of this commutative operator algebra plays a significant role in the harmonic analysis of modular forms and generalisations.

In mathematics, in particular in the theory of modular forms, a Hecke operator, studied by, is a certain kind of "averaging" operator that plays a significant role in the structure of vector spaces of modular forms and more general automorphic representations.


From another point of view.

A time to digital converter assigns timestamps. The time to digital converter needs fast rising edges with normed height. The plastic scintillation counter delivers fast rising edge with varying heights. Theoretically, the signal could be split into two parts. One part would be delayed and the other low pass filtered, inverted and then used in a variable gain amplifier to amplify the original signal to the desired height. Practically, it is difficult to achieve a high dynamic range for the variable gain amplifier, and analog computers have problems with the inverse value.

Principle of operation.

The incoming signal is split into three components. One component is delayed by a time formula_2, with formula_3 - it may be multiplied by a small factor to put emphasis on the leading edge of the pulse - and connected to the noninverting input of a comparator. One component is connected to the inverting input of this comparator. One component is connected to the noninverting input of another comparator. A threshold value is connected to the inverting input of the other comparator. The output of both comparators is fed through an AND gate. A discriminator without that constant fraction would just be a comparator.  Therefore the word discriminator is used for something different (namely for an FM-demodulator).  Often the logic levels are shifted from -15 V < low < 0 < high < 15 V delivered by the comparator to 0 V < low < 1.5 V < high < 3.3 V needed by CMOS logic.

Applications.

If the discriminator triggers a sampler with a following comparator this is called a single channel analyzer (SCA). If an Analog-to-digital converter is used, this is called a multi channel analyzer (MCA).  http://www.ortec-online.com/download/Fast-Timing-Discriminator-Introduction.pdf

A constant fraction discriminator (CFD) is an electronic signal processing device, designed to mimic the mathematical operation of finding a maximum of a pulse by finding the zero of its slope. Some signals do not have a sharp maximum, but short rise times formula_1.


Plot.

Ray Aibelli has finished his first year of college at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and has received a prestigious summer medical internship which he has to forego to take care of his mother, Susan Aibelli, a married, lonely woman, who has suffered a leg injury at home just as her husband is about to leave on his job as a traveling salesman. Ray's relationship with his father is seen to be troubled as his father is overly controlling. The relationship between Susan and Mr. Aibelli is also shown to be suffering because he is later shown to be cheating with prostitutes and Susan feels disappointed by her lack of achievement in life.  Ray has to take care of his mother by helping her to shower and massaging her legs leading to him seeing her naked and experiencing a moment of intimacy when he massages her upper thigh. He feels extreme guilt for his incestuous sexual feelings and rubs his skin raw to punish himself. His sexual frustration is increased due to the fact that he is unable to masturbate, due to the family's dog repeatedly interrupting him. His high school friends are shown to be immature and Ray is seen to feel increasingly isolated from them. He also begins a relationship with local teenager Toni Peck who he struggles to communicate with both socially and when having sex, leading to an accusation of rape.  Ray explains to his mother how their sexual encounter developed and she offers him sexual advice and he later openly stares at her body in the shower, increasing their physical intimacy. Ray has an opportunity to leave his mother behind when his aunt, Helen, offers to be her caretaker and he excitedly prepares to leave the next day. Both Ray and Susan are annoyed by Helen and they have a sexual encounter late at night that leads to Ray missing his bus the next day. Ray's father informs him that he will no longer be able to pay for his university tuition causing him to become even more stressed about his future.  Toni and Ray are seen to have resumed their sexual relationship and are kissing when Susan interrupts them, she slaps Toni and injures her. Ray and Susan have a loud argument that quickly devolves into groping and kissing. Toni's father comes to their house to complain but Susan is able to flirt with him and prevent him from punishing Ray.  Ray attempts to commit suicide by hanging himself from the bathroom door but Susan interrupts him, he complains that he can't achieve anything here and attempts to initiate sexual contact with Susan. He kisses her passionately but then pulls back and attempts to strangle her to death before stopping. His friends invite him to hang out with them again and he accepts joining them near the river. After being provoked by one of his friends he jumps off a steep cliff and is seen hitching a ride with a truck driver early the next morning.

Music.

Select tracks from Morphine's album "Cure for Pain" are used throughout the film, including "In Spite of Me" which plays over the end credits.

Reception.

"Spanking the Monkey" was a box office success, grossing $1,359,736 on a $200,000 budget.  On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 91% based on reviews from 23 critics. The site's consensus states: "David O. Russell's feature debut scores with an endearing cast and offbeat humor, finding compelling sweetness in perverse places." On Metacritic it has a score of 66% based on reviews from 15 critics.  The film won the Audience Award at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival and the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay.

Spanking the Monkey is a 1994 American black comedy film written and directed by David O. Russell. The title is a slang phrase for masturbation and is used in the film by one of the teenage characters. It was filmed in Pawling, New York.


Overview.

Ogo uses the IXI-Connect OS. It features a clamshell design with a 12-bit depth color screen on the top half and a full QWERTY keyboard on the lower half. Navigation through the menus is accomplished primarily through the use of a directional pad located on the lower right hand of the device and alternately through buttons that directly access each of the devices features.  The Ogo is part of a family of devices produced by its overseas manufacturer, IXI, which showcase the "personal mobile gateway" concept, wherein the Ogo acts as a wireless gateway for other Bluetooth enabled devices to access the Internet. Other devices in the family include pens and cameras. With support for AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo Instant Messenger, and MSN Windows Messenger, it’s at least as equipped for IM as any phone you could hope for. The Ogo supports POP3 e-mail, but that’s about it. The Ogo is not a phone and has no voice features.  AT&T deliberately omitted the wireless gateway capabilities of the Ogo in all domestic advertising, possibly in a bid to keep the device from being used as a flat-rate wireless modem.  After the acquisition of AT&T Wireless by Cingular, the Ogo was no longer offered. Cingular discontinued its Ogo service on October 10, 2006.  The device is also marketed in Germany by 1&1. In Germany, the OGO is called a Pocket Web. The OGO can web surf, email, sync with outlook, IM and all the other things like the US based OGO but can not play MP3s. It is also available in Austria through A1 and in Switzerland through Swisscom carrier.

Technical data.

Size 11.5 cm × 7.5 cm × 2.5 cm  Weight  162 g  Display  240×160 Pixel = 1/8 VGA with 4096 Colors  Battery Life  120 hours standby, 2.5 hours fully functioning, charges with a normal USB Mini-Cable (5V)  Ports  Mini USB, Headphone connection (for the CT-17 and CT-12 version)  Optical Highlights  Backlighting for monitor and for keyboard, 2 color LED for new messages and for charging  Speaker  Monospeaker, 0.8 watt with 8 Ω Processor  Texas Instruments OMAP P330B with 200 MHz  Memory  16 MB-RAM and 32 MB NAND-ROM Flash memory (Samsung)  Wireless connections  Quadband Chip w/ memory ROM, Dualband 900/1800 (CT-17/CT-12) i.e. 850/1900 (CT-15/CT-10) GSM with GPRS-with data relay capabilities SAR 0.596 W/kg  Keyboard  QWERTZ keyboard, Navi button  Software Base  Operating System  IXI-Connect OS proprietary system written in C, kernel is based on NucleosOS  Browser  Obigo Browser: Gecko Engine (like Mozilla 4.0)  Protocols  IMAP, HTTP, WSP, SyncML, FOTA, RSS

Wireless data.

The Ogo is indeed capable of being used as a fully functional GPRS Bluetooth modem. Connectivity to Windows and Apple computers is still possible, provided a still-activated Ogo is available. The device shows up as a standard bluetooth device.  The European version connects to the web and email push system via the Vodafone GPRS network.

Ogo is a handheld electronic device which allows the user to communicate via instant messaging services, email, MMS and SMS text messages. The device works through GSM cellular networks and allows unlimited usage for a flat monthly fee. It supports AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, and MSN Messenger. It was released in 2004


Early life.

Napier was born in Mt. Union, Kentucky near Scottsville. His parents were Sara Lena (née Loafman; 1897–1974) and Linus Pitts Napier (1888–1991). After graduating from high school, he enlisted in the United States Army in 1954, serving with the 11th Airborne Division and rising to the rank of sergeant.  After his service, he attended Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, graduating in 1961 with a major in art and minor in physical education. He wanted to be a basketball coach and his first job was as an assistant coach at his old high school in Allen County, coaching under Allen County legend James Bazzell. Soon after, he gave up coaching, eventually taking jobs with a bridge company and an advertising agency before moving to Clearwater, Florida to teach art at JFK Junior High School.  In 1964, he returned to attend graduate school at Western Kentucky where he was encouraged to pursue acting by instructor D. Russell Miller. Following some success in the local Alley Playhouse, Napier moved back to Florida where he continued to teach as well as act in community theater, eventually moving into Clearwater's Little Theatre as its live-in caretaker. During this time he also pursued painting.

Career.

After a spell in New York Napier moved to California. He acquired an agent and a union card (for a bit part in ""). His movie debut came about by accident. A girlfriend took Napier along when she went to audition for Russ Meyer, who cast Napier as the male lead in "Cherry, Harry & Raquel!". In addition to acting and helping with the cameras when setting up shots, he did stunts, make up and driving on the film. After the low budget "Moonfire", he worked as a journalist and photographer for "Overdrive" magazine for a few years; a strike sent him back to Hollywood in 1975 where, at age 39, he was reduced to living in his car in the parking lot of Meyer's office with no money, work or agent. He was summoned to Universal Studios to meet Alfred Hitchcock (who had just seen a print of "Supervixens") and Napier was given a one-year contract.  Napier became a prolific character actor, appearing regularly in TV series of the time, and a number of pilots. In 1977, he was cast as frontier scout Luther Sprague in the six-episode NBC western television series, "The Oregon Trail". He appeared in two episodes of the 1980s hit TV series "The A-Team" as Col. Briggs. He also co-starred in two "The Rockford Files" episodes, and played Hammer in the series "B.J. and the Bear" in the 1970s. Napier as Wolfson Lucas was teamed with Rod Taylor again for the series "Outlaws". He is known among "Star Trek" fans for appearing on both "" episode "The Way to Eden" as musically inclined space hippie Adam, and the "" episode "Little Green Men" as General Denning. He also appeared in the pilot episode of "Knight Rider" in 1982.  The director of "Citizen's Band", Jonathan Demme, was laudatory about Napier's abilities, and went on to cast him in several films including "The Silence of the Lambs" and, in what was Napier's favourite role of his career, a judge in "Philadelphia". He played the bureaucratic CIA officer Marshall Murdock in "". For the 1980 musical-comedy, "The Blues Brothers", he portrayed the apoplectic Tucker McElroy, lead singer of and driver of the Winnebago for "The Good Ol' Boys."  Napier was in many advertisements. He performed a great deal of voice-over work in "", "Justice League", "", "The Critic", "", "Squidbillies", and some of the Hulk's growls on the series "The Incredible Hulk". He also provided several guest voices for episodes of "The Simpsons."  He had a small role during the sixth season of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" in 2008 as a barber who assaults and drives Larry David from his shop after David offends him. Napier appeared in the 2009 horror film "Murder World" alongside Scout Taylor-Compton. His last film role was in the 2009 comedy "" opposite Jeremy Piven and James Brolin".  Prior to his death in October 2011, Napier published a book about his life and experiences in Hollywood, titled "Square Jaw and Big Heart", with Dante W. Renzulli Jr. as co-author. The publisher of the book is BearManor Media of Albany, Georgia ().

Personal life.

Napier was married twice. His first wife was Delores Wilson. After his divorce, he married Dee Napier. Napier and his wife appeared on the Dr. Phil show in 2003 to discuss his obsession with being famous. According to the Dr. Phil Show website, "Despite appearing in close to 100 films and countless hit TV shows, Charles Napier says he's depressed he's not a big star. His wife, Dee, says that instead of becoming upset when he gets rejected for a part, Charles should be grateful and proud of his 35-year career. She also thinks it's time he started making the family, not the pursuit of fame, his priority."  Napier and his second wife had two children, son Hunter and daughter Meghan. Napier also had one son, Charles Lewis "Chuck" Napier Jr., from his previous marriage.

Death.

Napier died on October 5, 2011, after collapsing the previous day. He was 75 years old. The exact cause of death was not released, but Napier had been treated for deep vein thrombosis in his legs in May 2010.

References.

Bibliography

Charles Lewis Napier (April 12, 1936 – October 5, 2011) was an American character actor in film and television, and a comedian known for his prolific career playing memorable supporting and leading roles in genre cinema, often in the role of a police officer, soldier, or authority figure. After leaving his Kentucky hometown to serve in the army, he graduated from college and worked as a sports coach and art teacher before settling on acting as a career. Napier established himself in character roles and worked steadily for the next 35 years. He made numerous collaborations with director Jonathan Demme, including roles in the critically acclaimed drama "Philadelphia", comedy "Married to the Mob", historical horror-drama "Beloved", the political-thriller remake "The Manchurian Candidate", and the Best Picture-winning psychological horror film adaptation "The Silence of the Lambs".


Life.

Sun Ben was the elder son of Sun Qiang, the elder brother of Sun Jian. Sun Qiang died early, and so his sons were taken in by their uncle. Sun Ben followed his uncle in battle after Sun Jian's return from Luoyang, and led a unit during Sun Jian's attack on Liu Biao. When Sun Jian died, Sun Ben, being older than Sun Ce, gathered many of the soldiers and generals and went to Yuan Shu, who had been Sun Jian's overlord.  Sun Ben served under Yuan Shu for a time, along with Sun Jian's brother-in-law, Wu Jing (the brother of Sun Jian's wife Lady Wu). He served as Inspector of Yu Province, but the position was mostly nominal, for he was still young. He met Zhou Yu, and joined him to aid Wu Jing, who was under attack from Liu Yao. Sun Ce soon arrived as well, and both Zhou Yu and Sun Ben joined his army. Wu Jing was saved, and Sun Ben was reunited with his family under Yuan Shu.  As a reward for his duties, Sun Ben was made Grand Administrator of Yuzhang Commandery, while Sun Fu was sent to Luling Commandery. When Yuan Shu went out to battle Liu Bei, Sun Ben was assigned to defend Shouchun. When Yuan Shu declared himself emperor, Sun Ben, Wu Jing, Zhou Yu and Lu Su all abandoned him and joined Sun Ce. Sun Ben's wife and children, however, were detained in the city and were unable to join him until later.  In 197, Sun Ce and Lü Bu allied with each other to defeat Yuan Shu. Sun Ben and Sun Fu led the attack against Liu Xun, easily scoring a victory.  In 200, Sun Ce died, and both Sun Ben and Sun Fu were uneasy about the young Sun Quan being his heir, both being his elder. The two were stationed in Yuzhang when Cao Cao began his advance southward. Sun Fu wrote a letter intending to surrender to Cao Cao, but he was stripped of all rank, and his advisors were executed. Sun Ben also was contemplating surrender, but it is said that Zhu Zhi dissuaded him, and he served at the Battle of Red Cliffs. A few months after, however, Sun Ben died of illness. His son, Sun Lin, succeeded him.  At the time of his death, it is said that an edict was in Sun Ben's possession – an edict delivered from the capital offering him a high rank under Cao Cao. It is possible that Sun Ben died of distress.

Sun Ben ( 190s–200s), courtesy name Boyang, was a cousin of Sun Quan, a Chinese warlord who lived during the late Eastern Han dynasty and later became the founding emperor of the state of Eastern Wu in the Three Kingdoms period. He was the eldest son of Sun Qiang, the elder brother of Sun Quan's father Sun Jian. He first served Sun Jian in the campaign against Dong Zhuo. After Sun Jian's death, he took control of the army and went to serve Yuan Shu. He would soon rejoin Sun Ce (Sun Jian's eldest son and successor). He died of illness after the Battle of Red Cliffs. He was succeeded by his son Sun Lin (孫鄰).


Career.

The band had five Top 40 singles from two albums in the UK. Their biggest commercial success came with the singles "I Say Nothing", "Don't Call Me Baby", "Monsters and Angels" and "I Think I Love You", taken from albums "Let It Bee" and "Honey Lingers". "Sex & Misery", a third album, was released in 1996; by this point sisters Tracey and Melissa were the sole group members. The band reformed in 2003 to play a two-week UK tour.  The members of Voice of the Beehive have gone their separate ways. Tracey Bryn is a teacher in Laguna Beach, California. Melissa Belland runs her own company Made in Heaven, also in Laguna Beach. Martin Brett runs Brett Dempsey Music Productions in London and joined I, Ludicrous on bass guitar in 2008. In 2011, he released his first solo single "Lover's Lane" under his original punk name Brett Martini. He also trained to become a facial hair specialist for film, theatre, and television in 2010. Daniel "Woody" Woodgate still plays drums, together with Mark Bedford on bass, in Madness. Mike Jones lives in Norwich, England and still plays guitar.  In October 2017, Bryn and Belland reformed with the original line-up to play a pair of concert dates in London, including the '80s/'90s revival show Indie Daze 4.

Discography.

Other appearances.

Voice of the Beehive provided harmonies on Bill Drummond's album, "The Man" (1986).  An early version of "Beat of Love" was featured on the London Records compilation "Giant" (1987).  Melissa and Tracey contributed a cover of "Three Feet High and Rising" to the Johnny Cash tribute album "Til Things Are Brighter" (1988).  In 1993, Voice of the Beehive contributed a cover version of "Gimme Shelter" with Jimmy Somerville to an EP released to raise funds for the Putting Our House in Order homeless initiative. The single, which contained different duet versions of the song on each format, peaked at No. 23 in the UK, and No. 214 in Australia.

Voice of the Beehive was an Anglo-American alternative pop rock band formed in London in 1986 by Californian sisters Tracey Bryn and Melissa Brooke Belland, daughters of The Four Preps singer Bruce Belland. They teamed with British musicians Mike Jones, Martin Brett, Mark Bedford and Daniel Woodgate, the latter two of which were former members of Madness. Bedford left after making formative contributions to the band and did not feature again, while Woodgate stayed for most of the band's main period of activity. The band took their name from the Greek meaning of the name Melissa, meaning honey bee.


Early life.

Samuel Morton Peto, normally called Morton Peto, was born on 4 August 1809, in Woking, Surrey. As a youth, he was apprenticed as a bricklayer to his uncle Henry Peto, who ran a building firm in London.

Career.

When his uncle died in 1830, Peto and his older cousin, Thomas Grissell (who had been a partner to his uncle for five years), went into partnership. The firm of Grissell and Peto (1830–1847) built many well-known buildings in London, including the Reform Club, the Oxford & Cambridge Club, the Lyceum, St James's Theatre and Hungerford Market at Charing Cross. In addition, they built Nelson's Column and the new Houses of Parliament (1843) and the vast infrastructure project of the London brick sewer.  Another project, in 1848, was the Bloomsbury Baptist Chapel, the first Baptist church with spires in London. Tradition has it that the Crown Commissioner was reluctant to lease the land to nonconformists because of their "dull, spire-less architecture". Peto is said to have exclaimed, "A spire, my Lord? We shall have two!" The church had twin spires until 1951, when they were removed as unsafe.

Railway works.

In 1834 Peto saw the potential of the newly developing railways and dissolved the connection with his uncle's building firm. He and his cousin Grissell founded a business as an independent railway contractor. His firm's first railway work was to build two stations in Curzon Street, Birmingham. Next the firm built its first line of track, the Hanwell and Langley section of the Great Western Railway, which included the Wharncliffe Viaduct.  Grissell became increasingly nervous of the risks taken by Peto, and in 1846 dissolved the partnership.

Peto and Betts.

In 1848 Peto and Edward Betts (who had married Peto's sister Ann) entered into a formal partnership and together they were to work on a large number of railway contracts. Frequently, they also working in partnership with Thomas Brassey.  In 1854 during the Crimean War Peto, Betts and Brassey constructed the Grand Crimean Central Railway between Balaklava and Sevastopol to transport supplies to the troops at the front line.  In February 1855 the British government recognised Peto for his wartime services; he was made Baronet of Somerleyton Hall in the County of Suffolk. King Frederick VII of Denmark honoured Peto for establishing the Flensburg–Husum–Tönning Railway Company and its construction of railways in the Duchy of Schleswig, which led to a growing export/import trade with the port of Lowestoft. Another project abroad was the Homburg Railway built from 1859 to 1860.  The Peto and Betts partnership became insolvent in 1866 due to a combination of the failure of the bank, Overend, Gurney and Company, and their involvement in the failure of the London Chatham and Dover Railway.

Other activities.

In 1844, Peto bought Somerleyton Hall in Suffolk. He rebuilt the hall with contemporary amenities, as well as constructing a school and more houses in the village. He next built similar projects in Lowestoft. For many years he was the largest employer of labour in the entire world.  In 1846, Peto became co-treasurer of the Baptist Missionary Society. From 1855 to March 1867, he was sole treasurer, resigning after personal financial difficulties.  Peto served for two decades as a Member of Parliament. He was elected a Liberal Member for Norwich in 1847 to 1854, for Finsbury from 1859 to 1865, and for Bristol from 1865 to 1868. During this time he was one of the most prominent figures in public life. He helped to make a guarantee towards the financing of The Great Exhibition of 1851, backing Joseph Paxton's Crystal Palace.  In 1855 Peto was made a baronet; but in the 1860s his businesses ran into trouble, so that in 1863 he sold Somerlyton Hall and in 1866 became bankrupt.  After his involvement with the insolvency of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway in 1866, and the failure of the Peto and Betts partnership, Peto's personal reputation as a trustworthy businessman was badly damaged and never fully recovered.  In 1865 he is listed as living at Auchline House at Killin in Perthshire.  In 1868, he had to give up his seat in Parliament, despite having the support of both Benjamin Disraeli and William Ewart Gladstone. He exiled himself to Budapest and tried to promote railways in Russia and Hungary.  When he returned he became the main contractor for the Cornwall Minerals Railway which opened in 1874, but the failure of the related Cornish Consolidated Iron Mines Corporation meant that he sustained heavy losses when iron ore traffic on the CMR failed to live up to expectations. The CMR itself survived and began to recover after it had introduced passenger services in 1876 and was then leased by the Great Western Railway in 1877, but this improvement came too late for Peto.  He died in obscurity in 1889.

Legacy.

An extremely unfavourable portrait of Peto is included in the appendix to George Borrow's "Romany Rye", where he is described as "Mr. Flamson". When Peto promoted the Lowestoft Railway and Harbour Company in the 1840s, the railway split Borrow's estate at Oulton Broad, just outside Lowestoft. Borrow deeply resented this and bore a grudge against Peto thereafter.  Peto is commemorated by a portrait bust at Norwich railway station by John Pooler. Morton Peto Road, a road in Great Yarmouth, was named after him.  In Ashford, Kent, Samuel Peto Way is a residential road built upon the old Newtown Railway Works site and was named in his honour.  A portrait of Peto hangs outside the library at Regent's Park College, Oxford, in commemoration of his assistance with the college's move from Stepney to Regent's Park.

Family.

In May 1831 Peto married Mary Grissell, one of the sisters of his later partner, Thomas Grissell. They had four children before Mary's death in 1842:  Peto then married Sarah Ainsworth Kelsall, the daughter of Henry Kelsall of Rochdale. Peto and Sarah had many children. Of these:

Sir Samuel Morton Peto, 1st Baronet (4 August 1809 – 13 November 1889) was an English entrepreneur, civil engineer and railway developer, and, for more than 20 years, a Member of Parliament (MP). A partner in the firm of Grissell and Peto, he managed construction firms that built many major buildings and monuments in London, including The Reform Club, The Lyceum, Nelson's Column and the new Houses of Parliament; which made him a millionaire.


Biography.

Vera Margrethe Roscher Lund was born in Oslo and lived there until 1940, when she moved to Arendal. Her father was military officer, later Colonel Ragnvald Alfred Roscher Lund (1899–1975), the first commander of the Norwegian Military Intelligence Service, head of the Norwegian High Command's office FO II in exile in London during World War II. In 1944, she had to flee Norway during the Occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany.  She continued her secondary education at the Norwegian gymnasium in Uppsala, Sweden, and graduated in 1945. The following year she traveled to the United States where her family lived in New Jersey. She studied architecture at Yale University from 1946 to 1948. From 1948 to 1949, she studied art history and journalism at Columbia University. She married shipping executive, Olav Gotfred Henriksen in 1948. In total, she lived in the United States from 1946 to 1963.  Her first novel, "Sølvhammeren" ("The Silver Hammer") was published in 1961. This novel was followed by "Jærtegn" ("Miracle") in 1962, and "Helgenkongen" ("The Saint King") in 1963. The trilogy is about Olaf II of Norway and his time. In the 1970s she wrote a novel series from the period after the Protestant Reformation, "Trollsteinen" from 1970, followed by "Pilegrimsferd", "Blåbreen", "Staupet" and "Skjærsild", the last from 1977. Among her historical plays are "Asbjørn Selsbane" from 1972, and "Sverdet", first staged in 1974. She has also written books for children and young adults.  Vera Henriksen has an unusually broad and extensive range of writings behind her. She has written or delivered contributions to nearly fifty books. Central is a series of historical novels, some in several volumes, but she has also written contemporary novels, plays and nonfiction. Inspired by her father she developed an early interest in history, especially Norse saga literature. Several of her books center on the problematic transition from Norse mythology to Christianity.  In addition to her fiction writing, Henriksen has written several non-fiction books. Among these are two volumes of the history of the Royal Norwegian Air Force, covering the period from 1912 until 1945.  She was decorated Knight, First Class of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav in 1997. She was awarded the Norwegian Booksellers' Prize in 1962, and the Mads Wiel Nygaard's Endowment in 1978.

Vera Margrethe Henriksen (née Roscher Lund; 22 March 1927 – 23 May 2016) was a Norwegian novelist, playwright, and non-fiction writer. She was particularly known for her historical novels and plays set in the Middle Ages.


Early life and career.

Randhawa was born on 29th January 1976 in Raniganj, Asansol, West Bengal. Her father served in the Indian police, which enabled Kuljeet to travel across India including Patiala, Punjab where her father was serving at the time of her suicide. She began modelling as a student, and her work included several ads and runway shows for major designers. She earned her Honours in Psychology from Delhi University.  Randhawa began her career starring in Hip Hip Hurray replacing Shweta Salve as 'Prishita'. Her performance was appreciated but she came into the spotlight when she was signed as the new lead in UTV show C.A.T.S. where she again replaced an actress Karminder Kaur. The TV starring Nafisa Joseph and Malini Sharma became popular but remained slow on the ratings front. Randhawa was highly appreciated for her part as detective 'Ash'. Following the end of the series, Kuljeet continued to appear in many TV shows as cameos and side by side also featured in modelling assignments.  Randhawa saw a huge success as a model but was completely choosy when it comes to acting. After C.A.T.S. she was not seen in a lead role and after a long gap she returned in a lead role in Star One's Special Squad Star One. Randhawa was not happy with the content being portrayed on Indian Television where actresses were mostly crying. She always opted for bold and strong women centric roles which is why she used to get typecasted in thriller roles. Randhawa played a cop/detective in more than five TV shows which was a record for any Indian Television actress and a unique one which no actress could follow successfully.  Her performance was very well received in Special Squad but in order to increase the ratings, Gauri Pradhan Tejwani was signed as another female lead in the show. After six episodes, Kuljeet quit the show citing professional decisions however it was indicated that Kuljeet left the show because of Gauri which the previous declined later.  Right after she quit Special Squad, Randhawa was signed to play 'Irawati Kohli' in Cinevistaas and Sahara One Production 'Kohinoor'. In an exclusive chat transcript, Randhawa revealed details about the show, Special Squad, Nafisa Joseph and more about herself. The season one of Kohinoor was well received by the audience and the makers were planning another season but it couldn't materialize after Randhawa committed suicide in 2006.  Randhawa also appeared in several television series including "Hip Hip Hurray", "C.A.T.S.", and a lead role in STAR One's "Special Squad".  She was supposed to appear in a film called 'By Chance' but the film was stalled and never released  Besides Acting, Randhawa worked on a number of modelling assignments for brands like Reid and Taylor, Recova, Maggi, Anchor Switches etc.

Death.

On 8 February 2006, Kuljeet hanged herself in her apartment in Juhu, a town in western Maharashtra. In a suicide note, Kuljeet stated that she was ending her life as she was unable to cope with life's pressures. Shortly before her death, she had completed filming for the movie "By Chance". She died at the age of 30.

Kuljeet Randhawa (29th January 1976 – 8 February 2006) was an Indian model and actress. The former Gladrags model was known for her portrayal of bold and strong women-centric characters. She is best known for her work in TV series "C.A.T.S.", "Special Squad" and "Kohinoor".


Manufacturers.

As a result of heavy traffic demands on the Otavi Railway in South West Africa (SWA), three additional locomotives were ordered in 1931. The Class NG15 Mikado type narrow-gauge steam locomotive was designed by the South African Railways (SAR) and built by Henschel and Son for the Otavi Mining and Railway Company. The company operated the narrow-gauge Otavi Railway across the Namib Desert from Swakopmund on the Atlantic coast to Tsumeb and Grootfontein in northern SWA. The first three locomotives were delivered in 1931, numbered in the range from NG17 to NG19. They were followed by three more in 1939, numbered in the range from NG117 to NG119.  Ten more of these locomotives were built for the Otavi line by Société Franco-Belge and delivered in two batches of five in 1950 and 1953, numbered in the ranges from NG120 to NG124 and NG132 to NG136 respectively.  In 1958, five more of these locomotives, built by Henschel and numbered in the range from TC1 to TC5, were delivered to the Tsumeb Copper Corporation for use by the SAR in terms of an agreement between the SAR and the Corporation. They were later renumbered in the SAR range from NG144 to NG148.

Forerunners.

The Class NG15 locomotive was a development of the Class Hd and Class NG5 locomotives which had been acquired for the Otavi Mining and Railway Company in SWA in 1912 and 1921 respectively. In the 1920s, one of the Class NG5 locomotives was sent to the Avontuur Railway in South Africa for trials, but since it jammed on the tighter curves in the Langkloof despite having one set of flangeless coupled wheels, it was returned to SWA.  The usual practice of the SAR in the steam era was to design locomotives in their own drawing offices and to then go out and find a builder. The drawing board work for the Class NG15 has been attributed to a Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Otavi Railway, a German engineer known in SWA as Mr. Peters, who was employed as a draughtsman by the SAR. Since the earlier trials with the Class NG5 locomotive, the sharpest curves on the Avontuur line had been eased and the experience gained in the process was taken into consideration during the design of the Class NG15.

Characteristics.

Like the Class NG5, the locomotives were built on plate frames and their valves were actuated by Walschaerts valve gear, but they were fitted with piston valves instead of flat slide valves. While the sand boxes of the older locomotives were mounted on top of the boiler, aft of the dome on the Class Hd and ahead of the dome on the Class NG5, those of the Class NG15 were arranged on the running boards. The seats of the driver and stoker were mounted on poles which allowed them to be swung around to outside the cab and crews could often be seen riding outside in hot weather. Similar swing-seats were used on the SAR's narrow-gauge Garratts and on the Cape gauge Class 6 and Class 7.  Unlike the Class Hd and Class NG5 locomotives, their leading wheels were mounted in a Krauss-Helmholtz Bissel truck which was arranged in front instead of to the rear of the cylinders. The leading pair of coupled wheels of the Class NG15 had a limited amount of sideplay and were linked to the leading Bissel truck, while the axle of the leading coupled wheels still remained parallel to the other three coupled axles at all times.  This linking of a pony truck and coupled axle is known as a Krauss-Helmholtz bogie, an invention of Richard von Helmholtz who was the chief designer at the Krauss works in Munich from 1884 to 1917. On standard-gauge railways in Europe, the inclusion of a Krauss-Helmholtz bogie has allowed the use of large 2-10-0 locomotives on sharply curved mountain sections. Some early electric locomotives also used Krauss-Helmholtz bogies. The Class NG15 had larger tenders than the Class NG5 with a working order weight of, compared to the of the Class NG5's tender. The tenders had low-slung sides, with the bottom part of the water tank extending down to below axle level on either side of the tender bogies to lower the vehicle's roll centre on the narrow track gauge.  The original tenders were built as flat-sided box-shaped vehicles. A second tender version was delivered with the later batches of locomotives, with the coal bunker sides set inward for reasons unknown. The new shape made no difference to the crew's rearward field of vision and the only likely benefit was a reduced axle load as a result of the reduced coal capacity.

Service.

In SWA, the Class Hd, Class NG5 and Class NG15 Mikado locomotives operated in a common pool. They were the most powerful non-articulated narrow-gauge steam locomotives in SAR service.  In 1960, when all the SWA narrow-gauge lines were widened to Cape gauge, the Class Hd and Class NG5 locomotives were withdrawn from service while the 21 Class NG15 locomotives were all shipped to Port Elizabeth for use on the Langkloof line to Avontuur. The first one was offloaded in Port Elizabeth in April 1961, still equipped with a single central buffer and side chains, the preferred drawgear on the ex-German lines in SWA. Their arrival increased the number of locomotives on the Avontuur Railway from a total of 23 in March 1961 to 43 by July. As a result, all but one of the Class NG10 as well as Class NG G11 no. 51, South Africa’s first Garratt, were withdrawn from service by July 1962.  On the Avontuur Railway, the Class NG15 was nicknamed "Kalahari", inappropriately so since its previous stamping ground was across the Namib desert to the west of the Kalahari. Garratts initially continued to operate in the Langkloof since the Class NG15 was not allowed to work beyond Humansdorp from Port Elizabeth because of a lack of turning facilities, the only existing triangle at the time being the one at the end of the line at Avontuur. More turning facilities had not been required until then since the Langkloof had for years been the domain of bi-directional Garratt locomotives. During 1963-1964, turning facilities were installed at Assegaaibos, Louterwater and Misgund. From then on the use of Garratts west of Assegaaibos was confined mainly, but not entirely, to the daily transship and pick-up (T&P) workings.  Even though Garratts were still present, the Class NG15 with its spacious cab soon became the enginemen’s favourites. They were free-steaming and fast and there was little difference in hauling capacity between the two types. The Class NG15s and their crews were soon doing round trips of just over in one shift to Assegaaibos and back, unheard of in the Garratt days. In the fruit season the "Kalaharis" regularly logged more than per month.  During the last years of steam traction on the Avontuur Railway, the Class NG15 was the only non-Garratt steam locomotive working in the Langkloof. Outside the apple season, the Class NG15 became well known for hauling the "Apple Express" from the Humewood Road railway station in Port Elizabeth to Loerie and back every Saturday to cater for tourists. It gained further fame when the "Apple Express" instituted an annual train race marathon, where athletes could compete against an "Apple Express" train filled with spectators.  Towards the end of 1986, preparations commenced to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the opening of the Apple Train line to Avontuur on 1 January 1907. Numbers NG122 and NG124 were repainted at Humewood diesel depot in red and green respectively and no. NG122 was fitted with a headboard with an apple logo. The red no. NG122 was named "Starking" after the red apple variety grown in the Langkloof and the green no. NG124 was named "Granny Smith" after the green apples that finished off each season.  In c. 1990, numbers NG19 and NG146 were sold to private individuals and relocated to the Alfred County Railway (ACR) at Port Shepstone in Natal. No. NG19 was stored in poor condition, amongst others without a cab and chimney, and was never used by the ACR. It is believed the owner sold it to or came to an arrangement with Sandstone Estates who collected the engine on 11 April 2003 and the tender on 18 July 2003.  No. NG146 appeared to be staged out of use until late April 1992, when it was found being repaired. It re-entered traffic on the ACR’s Izotsha trains on the Harding line before the end of May 1992. After a triangle was installed at Paddock in June 1994 it was also able to work Paddock trains. The locomotive was eventually sold by its owner to the Brecon Mountain Railway in the United Kingdom and was loaded on a road rig for transport to Durban Harbour on 17 September 2001.

End of steam.

In 1973, steam traction in the Langkloof began to be replaced by diesel-electric power upon the introduction of the General Electric-built Class 91-000 type GE UM6B diesel-electric locomotive. Diesel and steam served the Langkloof together for some years, but by the late 1980s road transport had triumphed over rail transport on the apple route as well and the narrow-gauge steam fleet was withdrawn from service. Engine no. NG147, the last "Kalahari", was plinthed next to the now unused Avontuur Station while the red no. NG122 "Starking" is on display at the Outeniqua Transport Museum in George.

Works numbers.

The builders, works numbers and SAR renumbering of the Class NG15 locomotives are listed in the table.

Current locomotive status.

Since the preservation of heritage locomotives is always dependent on the attitude and disposition of the current incumbents of positions of authority, the current status as set out in the table should be considered as a snapshot of the situation at a point in time. The information was last updated on 29 May 2017.

Illustration.

The main picture shows Franco-Belge-built no. NG124 equipped with smoke deflectors, crossing the Van Stadens River with the "Apple Express" on 26 October 1985.

The South African Railways Class NG15 2-8-2 is a class of narrow-gauge steam locomotive. In 1931, three narrow-gauge Class NG15 locomotives with a Mikado type wheel arrangement, similar in design to the existing Class Hd and Class NG5 locomotives, were acquired by the South African Railways for the Otavi Mining and Railway Company in South West Africa. More were purchased for the Otavi Railway and the Tsumeb Copper Corporation during the subsequent years, eventually bringing the total number of these locomotives to 21 by 1958.


History.

The Cathedral Treasury derives from the treasury of the former Canonesses of Essen, which passed to St Johann Baptist after the secularisation of the order in 1803.  During the Ruhr Uprising in 1920, the entire treasury was smuggled out to Hildesheim in secret, from which it was returned in 1925.  During the Second World War the Treasury was taken first to Warstein, then to Albrechtsburg in Meissen and from there to Siegen, where it was sealed in Hain tunnel to protect it from aerial bombing. After the end of the war it was found there by American troops and brought to the State Museum in Marburg, and later to a collection of displaced artworks in Schloss Dyck, Rheydt. From April to October 1949, the Essen Cathedral Treasury was displayed in Brussels and Amsterdam and after that it was brought back to Essen.  In 1953 the Treasure was displayed in an exhibition in the Villa Hügel. In 1957 the Treasure became the property of the then newly established Diocese of Essen. The Treasury Chamber was first made accessible to the public without charge in 1958 at the wish of the first Bishop of Essen, Franz Hengsbach.  The Treasury had to be closed from 15 September 2008 until 15 May 2009 for a structural extension. The Treasure was displayed as the opening exhibit of the Ruhr Museum in the former coal washery of the Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex from 20 October 2008 until 8 February 2009 with the tagline "Gold vor Schwarz" (“Gold in Black”). The new display of the Cathedral Treasure was opened on 15 May 2009, which was over seventy percent larger than the previous space and improved in line with the latest ideas in museum education.

Collection.

The collection is exceptional in its completeness because only a few pieces of the Abbey's Treasure, such as the golden shrine of St Marsus have been lost in the course of time, and particularly because the "liber ordinarius" survives, in which the liturgical use of the objects is laid out. The Essen Cathedral Treasury contains several artistically significant works, particularly from the Ottonian period, such as:  In addition to the Ottonian artworks, valuable objects from later times also belong to the Cathedral Treasury, such as the Bust of Marsus and sixteen Burgundian fibulae from the fourteenth century. Several manuscripts also belong to the Cathedral Treasury, including the Great Carolingian Gospels (Ms. 1) of linguistical and artistic significance, the "Liber Ordinarius" of Essen (Ms. 19), and the Necrology of Essen (Ms. 20).  There is also a vitrine in the Treasury with loaned items from the Diocesan Museum, such as the crosier, mitres, pectoral crosses and rings of the deceased Bishops of Essen.

The Essen Cathedral Treasury (German: Essener Domschatz) is one of the most significant collections of religious artworks in Germany. A great number of items of treasure are accessible to the public in the treasury chamber of Essen Minster. The cathedral chapter manages the treasury chamber, not as a museum as in some places, but as the place in which liturgical implements and objects are kept, which continued to be used to this day in the service of God, so far as their conservation requirements allow.