History.

The region was originally inhabited by various tribes of American Indians, including the early Mound Builders. Around 1780, Captain Samuel Brady achieved notoriety for his activities in the area, including his famous leap of over the Cuyahoga River to avoid capture by an unknown band of American Indians. The site, known as Brady's Leap, is now a city park. Settlement by Europeans began in the late 1790s and early 19th century. As part of the Connecticut Western Reserve, the area was divided into survey townships in 1798 and almost all of what is now Kent was originally part of Town 3 Range 9, which would eventually be known as Franklin Township. Aaron Olmsted, a wealthy Connecticut merchant, had purchased the township and named it for his son Aaron Franklin Olmsted.  Franklin Township was surveyed in 1803 and settled in November 1805 when John Haymaker and his family moved west from Warren to the banks of the Cuyahoga River. They were joined by John's brother George and their father Jacob Haymaker and their families early the next year, and built a gristmill in 1807. Initial growth in the area was slow, but eventually two small villages would develop due to the potential for power generated by the Cuyahoga River that could be used in gristmills and manufacturing. The first village, known as Franklin Mills, or locally as the "Lower Village", developed mostly around the original Haymaker property. In 1818, Joshua Woodard arrived in the area and began constructing buildings just north of the village forming the "Upper Village" that would come to be known briefly as Carthage. In the 1820s, Franklin Mills was included in the route of the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal (P & O Canal). When construction began on the canal in the mid-1830s, land speculation was rampant in many areas of northeast Ohio along the canal, including Franklin Mills. As a result, an industrial and business region was established along the east side of the river in what is now downtown Kent. Factories and mills were either planned or constructed along the Cuyahoga River, some of which either were never built or ultimately failed, due mostly to effects of the Panic of 1837. A lock and attached arch dam, however, was completed in 1836. The canal officially opened in 1840, but would only operate into the 1860s. By the 1870s the canal was completely shut down.  In the era leading up to the American Civil War, Franklin Mills was an active stop on the Underground Railroad, giving fugitive slaves shelter on their escape to Canada. There were three notable stops in Franklin Mills, one of which still stands as of 2010. During this period, from 1835 to 1839, noted American abolitionist John Brown moved to the village, operating a tannery along the Cuyahoga River with Zenas Kent.  In 1863 the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad was constructed through Franklin Mills, due largely to the efforts of local businessman Marvin Kent, son of Zenas Kent. Marvin Kent had started his own railroad company, the Franklin and Warren Railroad, in 1851 after Franklin Mills, already home to several Kent family ventures and properties, was bypassed by the Cleveland and Pittsburgh Railroad that same year. Kent was also successful in getting the village named as the location of the railroad's maintenance yards and shops in 1864. The geographic location along the railroad and being home to the shops reinvented and revitalized the village as an important stop on the east-west line between St. Louis and New York City. The shops would open in 1865 and the railroad would play an important part of Kent's industry and development through the early 20th century before the shops were completely shut down in 1930. To honor Marvin Kent, the village was renamed Kent in 1864, although this change was not official until the village was incorporated on May 6, 1867.  John Davey came to Kent in 1881 as head grounds keeper at Standing Rock Cemetery, and planted several trees, landscaped the cemetery, and performed experiments on trees. In 1901, he published his theories on tree surgery with his book "The Tree Doctor", and later established the Davey Tree Expert Company in 1909. The efforts of Davey and the presence of Davey Tree led to the establishment of "The Tree City" as a nickname for Kent, which is reflected in the city's seal. The company continues to be headquartered in Kent and serves as the city's largest private employer.  After a fire destroyed the Seneca Chain Company in 1909, one of the city's main industries at the time, city leaders created the Kent Board of Trade in 1910, a forerunner to the Chamber of Commerce. The new Board was successful later that year in having Kent selected out of twenty northeastern Ohio cities as the site of a new teacher training college, which became known as the "Kent State Normal School". The site for the school was on of land donated by William S. Kent, son of Marvin Kent, on what was then the eastern edge of town. By 1929 the school was renamed Kent State College after the establishment of a college of liberal arts and degrees in the arts and sciences and in 1935 was renamed Kent State University after it was given authorization to grant advanced graduate degrees. The bill giving Kent State university status was signed into law by Ohio governor and Kent native Martin L. Davey, son of tree surgeon John Davey. During the 1950s and 1960s the growth of Kent State University combined with the effects of suburbanization resulted in significant population growth for the city, rising from just over 12,000 residents at the 1950 census to over 28,000 by 1970. Black squirrels were brought to the campus from Canada in 1961 by Kent State University head groundskeeper Larry Woodell. The squirrels have become an icon for both KSU and the city and are often used as unofficial mascots and symbols.  In early May 1970, protests began on the campus of Kent State University over the United States' invasion of Cambodia in the Vietnam War. These protests and demonstrations, which included rioting in downtown Kent on May 2, culminated in the Kent State shootings on May 4, 1970, where four students were killed and nine were wounded by the Ohio Army National Guard. Several memorials have been placed at the site over the years and commemorations have been held annually since 1971. In 2010 the entire site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Also during the late 1960s and into the 1970s, construction of Haymaker Parkway, completed in 1975, brought changes to the city's layout while eliminating ongoing problems with traffic congestion and blocked rail crossings.  In 1995, Kent received national attention when the city's water was named "Best Tasting Municipality Water" at the Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting. The water and mayor Kathleen Chandler were featured on the March 3 episode of "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno". Since then, Kent has placed in the top five a total of six times with the most recent being a fifth-place finish in 2011. In 2003, the 1836 arch dam was bypassed to meet water quality standards set by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. To preserve the historic dam, a small park was built behind the dam and the river was rerouted through the old canal lock. During warm-weather months, water is pumped over the dam. The park, known as Heritage Park, was formally dedicated in May 2005.

Geography.

Kent is located in west-central Portage County in Northeast Ohio approximately northeast of Akron and southeast of Cleveland. It is bordered by Franklin Township on the north and east, Brimfield Township on the south, and Stow on the west. Other nearby communities include Brady Lake and Ravenna to the east and Sugar Bush Knolls and Streetsboro to the north. It is included in the Akron Metropolitan Statistical Area and the larger Cleveland–Akron–Canton Combined Statistical Area.  Located on the western end of the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, the topography of Kent includes rolling hills and varied terrain. The Cuyahoga River passes through the city, cutting a gorge with a drop of nearly adjacent to the downtown area. The United States Geological Survey lists the city's elevation at above sea level at a point near Kent's geographic center. Elevations vary slightly within the city limits with several buildings on the Kent State University campus at altitudes in excess of and points as high as. According to the United States Census Bureau, as of 2010 the city has a total area of, of which is land and is water.

Climate.

Kent's climate is classified as a humid continental climate in the "Dfa" Köppen climate classification meaning it typically has very warm, humid summers and cold, snowy winters with moderate and variable spring and autumn seasons. The record high temperature is, set on July 7, 1988, with the record low of recorded January 17, 1982. During the spring and summer months, thunderstorms are fairly common and the area is susceptible to tornadoes, though the last recorded tornado in Kent occurred in 1973. Effects from tropical systems

Demographics.

As a college town, Kent's demographic and population statistics are greatly affected by the presence and growth of Kent State University. As a result, several statistics are noticeably higher or lower than state and national averages including median age and the percentage of residents in the 18–24 age bracket, individuals below the poverty line, and percentage of residents with a college degree.  Initial population growth in Kent was influenced by the location on the Cuyahoga River which led to the development of industrial and manufacturing jobs. Early settlers mainly came from the northeastern United States and were largely of German descent. After the arrival of the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad in 1863, growth was steady into the early 20th century with the village battling Ravenna for the position of Portage County's largest city. By the 1930 Census, Kent had passed Ravenna as the county's most populous city with even larger population growth in the 1950s and 1960s rising from 12,148 in 1950 to 28,183 by 1970. As of 2010, Kent remains the county's largest city. Most recent population measurements of the city have shown the effect of changes in the city's overall population coinciding with changes in the number of students living on campus as well as a reduction in the number of persons per housing unit.  As of the 2010 Census, there were 28,904 people living in the city for a population density of 3,150.5 people per square mile (1,216.4/km). There were 11,174 housing units at an average density of 1,218.0 per square mile (470.3/km). The racial makeup of the city was 83.1% White, 9.6% African American, 3.7% Asian, 0.2% Native American, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 0.5% from other races, and 2.9% from two or more races. 2.2% of the population is Hispanic or Latino of any race. Though slightly below the national averages for diversity, Kent is very close to the averages for Ohio and above the averages for the surrounding area. Between the 2000 and 2010 censuses,

Economy.

Kent's location along the Cuyahoga River and later the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal and multiple railroad lines made it attractive initially for the establishment of small gristmills for the production of flour and various factories. Progressively larger factories later developed due to increased power available from the river and eventually due to the ease and lower cost of transportation of goods to other markets. During the latter half of the 19th century and into the early 20th century, the city's largest employers were all industrially based, including the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad and its successors, which operated its main maintenance shops in the village; the Seneca Chain Company; and bus manufacturer Twin Coach among others. A disastrous fire at the Seneca Chain Company in 1909 led to the creation of the Kent Board of Trade—an early Chamber of Commerce—which was successful in getting Kent selected in 1910 as the site of what would become Kent State University.  Changes in the structure of the railroad and declines in the manufacturing sector during the mid-20th century combined with the rapid growth of Kent State University following World War II led to the university becoming the city's largest employer and influenced the development of other areas of the city's economy. Beginning in the late first decade of the 21st century, the university, along with the city and private investors,

Culture.

Cultural elements in Kent include various arts, environmental, and entertainment events during the year, as well as the Kent State University Museum. The Kent Heritage Festival is held every July in the downtown area, coinciding with the U.S. Independence Day. The festival includes crafts, booths, entertainment, train rides, 5K and 10K races, and fireworks, drawing approximately 25,000 people each year. In October, Kent hosts the homecoming festivities for Kent State University, including a parade down East Main Street as well as other events and activities both on campus and around the city. Also in October, the downtown area hosts an annual, yet unofficial, Halloween celebration, which usually takes place the last Saturday of October. The event typically draws thousands, largely Kent State students, and includes many who dress in costume. In 2007 Main Street Kent, a local organization that promotes downtown Kent, created a family-oriented Halloween event downtown that precedes the unofficial celebration. Since 2007, Kent has hosted an annual environmental festival known as "Who's Your Mama?" which takes place in conjunction with Earth Day. The festival has events at various locations in the city, such as a vegan chef competition, concerts, a film festival, guest speakers, and booths on environment-based topics. Through Main Street Kent, additional events downtown include an ice cream social event in August, an outdoor concert series and "sidewalk cinema" between May and September, an art and wine festival in June, a cider festival in November, and the Festival of Lights Christmas celebration in early December. Kent Potterfest, a festival celebrating the book and movie series "Harry Potter", debuted in late July 2016 and is held annually in the downtown area. It features "Harry Potter"-themed vendors and activities, a 5k run through the campus of Kent State University, a costume contest, and the transformation of Acorn Alley into Diagon Alley.  From May to October, the Haymaker Farmers' Market operates every Saturday morning in the downtown area adjacent to and under the Greer Bridge of Haymaker Parkway. The location is marked by a commissioned mural completed in October 2012 on the two bridge supports that line each side of the market's area. The market was established in 1992 and includes over 40 vendors, making it one of the oldest and largest farmers' markets in Northeast Ohio. An indoor Winter Market, established in 2008, is held Saturday mornings from November through April.

Sports.

As the home of Kent State University, Kent is also the home of the university's athletic teams, the Golden Flashes, who compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division I level as a member of the Mid-American Conference East Division. Several of Kent State's teams have enjoyed league and national success, the most notable being the men's basketball team's run to the Elite Eight in the 2002 NCAA Tournament and the baseball team's appearance in the 2012 College World Series. The 6,327-seat Memorial Athletic and Convocation Center, commonly referred to as the MAC Center, is the site of a number of athletic events in multiple sports, including wrestling, women's gymnastics, and women's volleyball in addition to men's and women's basketball. It is also a regular site

Parks and recreation.

The city operates nearly 20 parks and preserves, the largest of which is the Fred Fuller park along the Cuyahoga River, named after a former Kent Parks chairman. The park includes the Kramer Fields baseball and softball complex, which contains four fields, two of which are lighted. Several of the parks along the Cuyahoga River are on or near areas of historical significance. Franklin Mills Riveredge Park, which follows the Cuyahoga River through downtown Kent, passes through a large portion of the Kent Industrial District along with Heritage Park and includes sites related to the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal. Adjacent on the south is the John Brown Tannery Park, on the site of the former tannery John Brown helped fund with Zenas Kent in the 1830s, while Brady's Leap park, adjacent to the north, is at the location of the famed leap over the Cuyahoga River by Captain Samuel Brady circa 1780. The parks and recreation department, in addition to operating and maintaining the city's parks and preserves, also operates a recreation center on the city's south side and offers several sports, arts, and education programs at various locations in Kent. The department also sponsors events throughout the year including Art in the Park, an ice-skating party, hayrides, and Santa's Arrival. The Kent City School District operates an indoor pool

Government.

Kent is governed by a charter form of government with a council–manager system of nine council members and a mayor. The city is divided into six wards and voters select a mayor, a council member representing their ward, and three at-large council members in staggered four-year terms. The city charter, adopted in 1963, is reviewed by a charter commission every 10 years who then make recommendations for changes, the last review being in 2015. The city council hires a city manager who oversees the day-to-day operations in the various city departments and enforces policies set by council. The mayor serves a largely ceremonial role as president of the council and votes only in the event of a tie. Kent voters approved the change from a mayor-council system to council-manager in 1975 and it went into effect in 1977. Jerry Fiala began his term as mayor January 1, 2010, and Dave Ruller began serving as city manager June 15, 2005.  As part of the city government, Kent also has departments of community development, health, human services, law, parks and recreation, public safety, and public service. The Public Service Department oversees a variety of construction and maintenance works as well as the city's water treatment and water reclamation systems while the Public Safety Department includes both the police and fire departments. The Kent Police Department is housed

Education.

Preschool, elementary, and secondary education is mainly provided by the Kent City School District. A small portion of the city south of State Route 261 is part of the neighboring Field Local School District. The Kent district was created around 1860 and later merged with the Franklin Township and Brady Lake school districts in 1959. It serves most of Kent and Franklin Township, the villages of Brady Lake and Sugar Bush Knolls and a small part of southern Streetsboro. Kent has four neighborhood elementary schools that serve students in grades K–5, Stanton Middle School for grades 6–8, and Theodore Roosevelt High School for grades 9–12. The district also operates a preschool program housed at Davey Elementary School, and is a member of the Six District Educational Compact with five surrounding districts to facilitate vocational education, with many of these programs housed at Roosevelt High School. In 1985, Roosevelt High School was given the United States Department of Education Excellence in Education award and the school has consistently been rated "Excellent" by the Ohio Department of Education since 2004. For 2010 and 2015, it was named in "US News & World Report" as one of the best high schools in the United States, earning the publication's Bronze Medal designation. The Kent City School District has been consistently rated as "Excellent" or "Effective" by the Ohio

Media.

Kent is part of the Cleveland-Akron Television Market Area as defined by the Federal Communications Commission, which includes a 17-county region of Northeast Ohio. As of 2015 it ranks as the 18th-largest media market in the United States according to Nielsen Media Research. While most stations are located in Cleveland and Akron, Kent is home to the offices and main studio of Western Reserve Public Media, the PBS affiliate for Akron and Youngstown. The studios for WAOH and W35AX, local affiliates for the Retro Television Network, are located just east of the city limits in Franklin Township. TV-2, a Kent State University student-run production, is available on campus, on local cable, and online. Kent is also in range of the television stations that broadcast out of Youngstown. For radio, Kent is part of the, though it is within range of major stations in the as well as many in the and markets. Three stations, two FM and one AM, are licensed to Kent. WKSU, at 89.7 FM, broadcasts from the campus of Kent State University and is the main affiliate for National Public Radio in Northeast Ohio for the Akron, Canton, and Cleveland radio markets via repeaters around the

Infrastructure.

The city operates its own water system, drawing groundwater from wells with an adjacent water treatment plant located just outside the city limits in Franklin Township as well as using a water reclamation facility along the Cuyahoga River in the southwestern part of the city. Waste collection for the entire city is handled through a local private contractor and Portage County handles the city's recycling collection. Kent's original recycling program was developed in 1970 by the Kent Environmental Council and was Ohio's first comprehensive and self-supporting program. Local phone utilities are provided through AT&T Ohio through the 330 and 234 area codes, electricity is supplied and lines are maintained by FirstEnergy in the former coverage area of Ohio Edison, and natural gas is supplied and lines are maintained by Dominion Resources East Ohio Energy. While residents are free to choose their own natural gas and electric suppliers, the city is part of the Northeast Ohio Public Energy Council, or NOPEC, the largest government aggregation in the United States.

Transportation.

State Route 59 is the main east–west highway, following East and West Main Streets and Haymaker Parkway. Summit Street is another major east-west road mainly on Kent's eastern side, passing through and linking much of the Kent State campus. Fairchild Avenue is an important east-west road on the city's west side connecting with Stow and Cuyahoga Falls. State Route 43 is the main north–south highway, mainly following North Mantua and South Water Streets. SR 43 connects Kent with Interstate 76, approximately to the south via exit 33 in Brimfield and to the Ohio Turnpike/Interstate 80 and the eastern terminus of Interstate 480, approximately to the north via Turnpike exit 187 in Streetsboro. Both SR 43 and SR 59 are four to five-lane roads within the city limits. State Route 261 passes through the southern and eastern edges of the city and is a four-lane

Healthcare.

Hospital care is provided mainly through University Hospitals Portage Medical Center, affiliated with University Hospitals of Cleveland, which operates the UH Kent Health Center in the southern part of the city. The UH Kent Health Center includes an emergency services building with 24-hour emergency room and an urgent

Religion.

The earliest organized religious services in Kent were held in 1815 when a Methodist group was formed, followed by a Congregational church in 1819. The first religious meetinghouse in Kent, which also served as the first schoolhouse, was built in 1817 and was used by several different denominations. Later, the Methodists built another building in 1828 that was also used by multiple denominations. The oldest church building in Kent still used as a place of worship is the Unitarian Universalist Church on Gougler Avenue, which was dedicated in 1868. The former home of the Congregational Church was dedicated in 1858 and still stands along Gougler Avenue very near the Unitarian Universalist Church. It served as the home of the First Congregational Church—which became the Kent United Church of Christ in 1964—until 1955. It was later purchased by a local business and is used as their corporate

Notable people.

Kent has produced and been home to a number of notable individuals in varying fields. Its natives and residents are referred to as "Kentites". John Davey, a pioneer in tree surgery and founder of the Davey Tree Expert Company moved to Kent in the 1880s. His son, Martin L. Davey, would later serve as Governor of Ohio and a U.S. Representative. Other political figures to come from Kent include Wisconsin governor Lucius Fairchild, former U.S. Representative Robert E. Cook, and noted abolitionist John Brown, who lived in what was then Franklin Mills from 1835–1839. Noted athletes to have come from Kent include former National Football League players Mike Adamle, Tom DeLeone, and Stan White and former Major League Baseball player, manager, and executive Gene Michael. Three

Twin town.

Kent has one twin town, Dudince, a small spa town of about 1,500 people in southern Slovakia. The relationship was established in 2003 through Sister Cities International and resulted in the formation of the Kent-Dudince Sister City Association to promote learning and understanding of the Slovakian culture. The group meets regularly and organizes cultural exchanges and programs that feature Slovakian dance and music. Cultural exchanges have included a performance of a choir from Kent's Theodore Roosevelt High School in Dudince in 2004 and tour groups from Kent visiting in 2006 and 2008.

Kent is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the largest city in Portage County. It is located along the Cuyahoga River in Northeast Ohio on the western edge of the county. The population was 28,904 in the 2010 Census and was estimated at 29,646 in 2019. The city is counted as part of the Akron Metropolitan Statistical Area and the larger Cleveland–Akron–Canton Combined Statistical Area.

Kent ist eine Stadt in Ohio, USA. Im Jahr 2000 hatte sie 27.906 Einwohner. Sie ist der Hauptsitz der Kent State University.


Early years.

McWilliams was born December 13, 1905 in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. He first came to California in 1922, after a collapse in the cattle market ruined his father's health and his family's finances.  McWilliams attended the University of Southern California from which he obtained a law degree in 1927.  From 1927 to 1938, McWilliams practiced law in Los Angeles at Black, Hammock & Black. Some of his cases, including his defense of striking Mexican citrus workers, prefigured his later writing.  During the 1920s and early 1930s, McWilliams joined a loose network of mostly Southern California writers that included Robinson Jeffers, John Fante, Louis Adamic, and Upton Sinclair. His literary career also benefited greatly from his relationships with Mary Austin and H.L. Mencken. Mencken provided an outlet for McWilliams's early journalism and floated the idea for his first book, a 1929 biography of popular writer and sometime Californian Ambrose Bierce.

Political activity.

The Depression and the rise of European fascism in the 1930s radicalized McWilliams. He began working with left-wing political and legal organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Lawyers Guild. He also wrote for "Pacific Weekly," "Controversy," "The Nation", and other progressive magazines. He continued to represent workers in and around Los Angeles, helped organize unions and guilds, and served as a trial examiner for the new National Labor Relations Board.  His first bestseller, "Factories in the Field", appeared in 1939 and ranks among his most enduring works. Published within months of John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath", it examines the lives of migrant farm workers in California and condemns the politics and consequences of large-scale agribusiness. Shortly before its publication, McWilliams accepted an offer from incoming Governor Culbert Olson to head California's Division of Immigration and Housing. Over his four-year term (1938-1942), he focused on improving agricultural working conditions and wages, but his hopes for major reform deteriorated with the advent of World War II.  During the 1940s, McWilliams lived in Echo Park, California, a neighborhood of Los Angeles. He owned his home at 2041 Alvarado Street until the 1970s, well after he moved to New York in 1951.  McWilliams left his government post in 1942, when incoming Governor Earl Warren promised campaign audiences that his first official act would be to fire him. McWilliams was a sharp critic of Warren, whom he described as "the personification of Smart Reaction," but he became an enthusiastic admirer after Warren joined the US Supreme Court the following decade. No such conversion occurred in his attitude toward another California politician, Richard Nixon, whom McWilliams described in 1950 as "a dapper little man with an astonishing capacity for petty malice."  After leaving the state government, McWilliams continued to write prolifically. He turned his attention to issues of racial and ethnic equality, writing a series of important books (including "Brothers Under the Skin", "Prejudice", "North from Mexico", and "A Mask for Privilege") that dealt with the treatment of immigrant and minority groups. He also produced two regional portraits, "Southern California Country: An Island on the Land" (1946, American Folkways series) and "California: The Great Exception" (1949), which many aficionados still regard as the finest interpretive histories of those areas. Decades after its publication, "Southern California Country" inspired Robert Towne's Oscar-winning original screenplay for "Chinatown" (1974).

Accusations of communist sympathies.

"Witch Hunt" (1950) was an early attempt to combat McCarthyism, which McWilliams considered a grave threat to civil liberties and healthy politics. Although he was never a member of the Communist Party, he was a frequent target of anticommunist attacks. In the 1940s, he was called before the Committee on Un-American Activities in California. FBI director J. Edgar Hoover placed him on the Custodial Detention List, making him a candidate for detention in case of national emergency even though McWilliams was serving in the state government at the time.  His activism took many forms. In the early 1940s, he helped overturn the convictions of mostly Latino youths following the so-called Sleepy Lagoon murder trial. He also helped cool the city's temperature during the Zoot Suit Riots of 1943, when scuffles between servicemen and Latino youths spun out of control.  Once out of government, he became an outspoken critic of the removal and internment of Japanese American citizens and almost immediately began writing an exposé on the topic. Published in 1944, "Prejudice: Japanese-Americans: Symbol of Race Hatred" was cited repeatedly in the sole dissenting opinion in "Korematsu v. United States", the Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of the exclusion.  Several years later, a group of Los Angeles screenwriters, directors, and producers known as the Hollywood Ten was cited for contempt of Congress after refusing to answer a House committee's questions about Communist Party membership. McWilliams drafted a Supreme Court amicus brief for two of them, John Howard Lawson and Dalton Trumbo. (The Court declined to hear their appeal.)  In 1951, McWilliams moved to New York City to work at "The Nation" under editor Freda Kirchwey. For the next decade, he helped shepherd the magazine through its most difficult period. Taking over as editor in 1955, he stayed until 1975 and is credited with strengthening the magazine's investigative reporting. He also published the early work of Ralph Nader, Howard Zinn, Theodore Roszak, and Hunter S. Thompson, who credited McWilliams with the idea for his first bestselling book, "" (1966).

McWilliams and Bay of Pigs story.

McWilliams was the first American reporter to reveal that the CIA was training a group of Cuban exiles in Guatemala for the Bay of Pigs Invasion. His article for "The Nation", "Are We Training Cuban Guerrillas?", was published in November 1960, five months before the invasion occurred, during the Eisenhower Administration.  The story was largely ignored by major newspapers like "The New York Times" and "The Washington Post". Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., an aide to President John F. Kennedy, pressured "The New Republic" not to run a story about the guerrilla force. Following the failure of the invasion, Kennedy expressed regret that more information about the invasion plan was not published by telling "Times" reporter Turner Catledge, "If you had printed more about the operation, you would have saved us from a colossal mistake."

Death and legacy.

He died in New York City on June 27, 1980, at 74. Since his death, his critical fortunes have risen steadily. The American Political Science Association gives an annual Carey McWilliams Award "to honor a major journalistic contribution to our understanding of politics." In "Embattled Dreams" (2002), California historian Kevin Starr calls McWilliams "the single finest nonfiction on California–ever," and biographer Peter Richardson maintains that McWilliams might be the most versatile American public intellectual of the twentieth century.  His first son, Wilson Carey McWilliams, was a noted political scientist who taught at Rutgers University. His second son, Jerry McWilliams, was an expert on vinyl disc records preservation. McWilliams had two grandchildren: Susan McWilliams Barndt, a professor of politics at Pomona College, and Helen McWilliams, the lead singer of VAGIANT Boston.  His papers are housed in the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley and at Special Collections at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Carey McWilliams (December 13, 1905 – June 27, 1980) was an American author, editor, and lawyer. He is best known for his writings about California politics and culture, including the condition of migrant farm workers and the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. From 1955 to 1975, he edited "The Nation" magazine.

Carey McWilliams (* 13. Dezember 1905 in Steamboat Springs, Colorado; † 27. Juni 1980 in New York City, New York) war ein US-amerikanischer Journalist, Herausgeber und Rechtsanwalt.


Biography.

Michener wrote that he did not know who his biological parents were, or exactly when or where he was born. He was raised a Quaker by an adoptive mother, Mabel Michener, in Doylestown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania.  Michener graduated from Doylestown High School in 1925. He attended Swarthmore College, in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, where he played basketball and was a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity. After graduating summa cum laude in 1929, with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and History, he traveled and studied in Scotland at the University of St Andrews in the medieval town of St. Andrews, Fife on the coast of the North Sea for two years.  Michener took a job as a high school English teacher at The Hill School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. From 1933 to 1936, he taught English at George School in Newtown, Pennsylvania. He attended Colorado State Teachers College in Greeley, Colorado, (in 1970 renamed the University of Northern Colorado), where he earned a Master of Arts degree in Education. After graduation, he taught at the university and at College High School (the University Lab School) for several years. The library at the University of Northern Colorado was named after him in October 1972.  In 1935, Michener married Patti Koon. He accepted a Guest Lecturer position at Harvard, from 1939 to 1940, but left to join Macmillan Publishers as their social studies education editor.  Although as a Quaker he could have qualified as a conscientious objector and not been drafted into the military, Michener enlisted in the United States Navy during World War II (1941–1945). He traveled throughout the South Pacific Ocean on various assignments which he gained because his base commanders mistakenly thought his father was Admiral Marc Mitscher. His experiences during these travels inspired the stories published in his breakout work "Tales of the South Pacific".  In 1960, Michener was chairman of the Bucks County committee to elect Democrat John F. Kennedy as the 35th President. In 1962, he unsuccessfully ran as a Democratic Party candidate for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania, a decision he later considered a misstep. "My mistake was to run in 1962 as a Democratic candidate for Congress. [My wife] kept saying, 'Don't do it, don't do it.' I lost and went back to writing books."  In 1968, Michener served as the campaign manager for the third-term run of the twice-elected U.S. Senator Joseph S. Clark of Pennsylvania. Michener later served as Secretary for the 1967–1968 Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention. Also that year, Michener was a member of the Electoral College, serving as a Pennsylvania Democrat. He wrote about that experience in a political science text "", which was published the following year. In it, he suggested alternate systems, including using a direct popular vote by majority for the office of President of the United States and other more creative solutions.

Writing career.

Michener began his writing career during World War II, when as a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy he was assigned to the South Pacific as a naval historian. He later turned his notes and impressions into "Tales of the South Pacific" (1947), his first book, published when he was age 40. It won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1948, and Rodgers and Hammerstein adapted it as the hit Broadway musical "South Pacific", which premiered on Broadway in New York City in 1949. The musical was also adapted as eponymous feature films in 1958 and 2001.  In the late 1950s, Michener began working as a roving editor for the "Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature". He gave up that work in 1970.  Michener tried television writing but was unsuccessful. American television producer Bob Mann wanted Michener to co-create a weekly anthology series from "Tales of the South Pacific" and serve as narrator. Rodgers and Hammerstein, however, had bought all dramatic rights to the novel and did not relinquish their ownership. Michener did lend his name to a different television series, "Adventures in Paradise", in 1959, starring Gardner McKay as Captain Adam Troy in the sailing ship "Tiki III".  Michener was a popular writer during his lifetime; his novels sold an estimated 75 million copies worldwide. His novel "Hawaii" (1959), well-timed on its publication when Hawaii became the 50th state, was based on extensive research. He used this approach for nearly all of his subsequent novels, which were based on detailed historical, cultural, and even geological research. "Centennial" (1974), which documented several generations of families in the Rocky Mountains of the American West, was adapted as a popular 12-part television miniseries of the same name and aired on the National Broadcasting Company (NBC television network) from October 1978 through February 1979.  In 1996, State House Press published "James A. Michener: A Bibliography", compiled by David A. Groseclose. Its more than 2,500 entries from 1923 to 1995 include magazine articles, forewords, and other works.  Michener's prodigious output made for lengthy novels, several of which run more than 1,000 pages. The author states in "My Lost Mexico" (1992) that at times he would spend 12 to 15 hours per day at his typewriter for weeks on end, and that he used so much paper, his filing system had trouble keeping up.

Marriages.

Michener was married three times. In 1935, he married Patti Koon. In 1948, they divorced, and the same year Michener married his second wife, Vange Nord.  Michener met his third wife, Mari Yoriko Sabusawa, at a luncheon in Chicago. An American, she and her Japanese parents were interned in western camps that the U.S. government set up during the early years of World War II to hold ethnic Japanese from West Coast / Pacific communities. Michener divorced Nord in 1955 and married Sabusawa the same year. Sabusawa died in 1994.  Michener's novel "Sayonara" (1954) is quasi-autobiographical. Set during the early 1950s, it tells the story of Major Lloyd Gruver, a United States Air Force ace jet pilot in the Korean War (1950–1953), now stationed in Japan, who falls in love with Hana-Ogi, a Japanese woman. The novel follows their cross-cultural romance and illuminates the racism of the post-World War II time period. In 1957 it was adapted into the highly successful movie "Sayonara" which starred Marlon Brando, James Garner, Miiko Taka, and Red Buttons; Buttons won the 1958 Academy Award ("Oscar") for best supporting actor for his performance.

Philanthropist.

Michener became a major philanthropist, donating more than $100 million to educational, cultural, and writing institutions, including his "alma mater", Swarthmore College, the Iowa Writers Workshop, and the James A. Michener Art Museum, and more than $37 million to University of Texas at Austin. By 1992, his gifts made him UT Austin's largest single donor to that time. Over the years, Mari Michener played a major role in helping direct his donations.  In 1989, Michener donated the royalty earnings from the Canadian edition of his novel "Journey" (1989), published in Canada by McClelland & Stewart, to create the Journey Prize, an annual Canadian literary prize worth $10,000 (CDN) that is awarded for the year's best short story published by an emerging Canadian writer.

Final years and death.

In the Micheners' final years, he and his wife lived in Austin, Texas, and they endowed the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas at Austin. The Center provides three-year Michener Fellowships in fiction, poetry, playwriting and screenwriting to a small number of students.  Suffering from terminal kidney disease, in October 1997, Michener ended the daily dialysis treatment that had kept him alive for four years. He said he had accomplished what he wanted and did not want further physical complications. On October 16, 1997, he died of kidney failure, at age 90. Michener was cremated, and his ashes were placed next to those of his wife at Austin Memorial Park Cemetery in Austin, Texas.

Bequests.

Michener left most of his estate and book copyrights to Swarthmore College, where he earned his bachelor's degree. He had donated his papers to the University of Northern Colorado, where he earned his master's degree.

Honors.

Many of the fondest memories of my travels stem back to my years of military service in the New Hebrides – (now Vanuatu) – during the Pacific War years of the early 1940s...While those beautiful islands have changed much with progress in the ensuing years, I know from subsequent visits that the friendliness of the peoples, their infectious smiles and their open-heartedness will remain forever one of life's treasures.

James A. Michener Art Museum.

Opened in 1988, in Michener's hometown of Doylestown, Pennsylvania, the James A. Michener Art Museum houses collections of local and well-known artists. Michener pledged $5.5 million to the museum in 1996. Constructed from the remains of an old state prison, the museum is a non-profit organization with both permanent and rotating collections. Two prominent permanent fixtures are the James A. Michener display room and the Nakashima Reading Room, constructed in honor of his third wife's Japanese heritage. The museum is known for its permanent collection of Pennsylvania Impressionist paintings.

James A. Michener Society.

The James A. Michener Society was formed in the fall of 1998. It comprises people who share a common interest and admirers of Michener's life and work. The society sponsors a variety of activities and publishes an electronic internet newsletter. Annual meetings of members are held at locations closely associated with Michener's life. The society's purpose is to:

Works.

In addition to writing novels, short stories, and non-fiction, Michener was very involved with movies, TV series, and radio. The following is only a selection of the listings in the Library of Congress files.

James Albert Michener ( or ; February 3, 1907 – October 16, 1997) was an American author. He wrote more than 40 books, most of which were lengthy, fictional family sagas covering the lives of many generations in particular geographic locales and incorporating solid history. Michener had numerous bestsellers and works selected for Book of the Month Club, and was known for his meticulous research behind the books.

James Albert Michener (* 3. Februar 1907 in New York City; † 16. Oktober 1997 in Austin, Texas) war ein US-amerikanischer Schriftsteller.


Biography.

Andrew Blake began his career working on movies for Playboy, and then for Penthouse but shifted to working independently in the 1990s. Most of Blake's films are released through his own production company, Studio A Entertainment. Andrew Blake is a member of the AVN Hall of Fame (200?) and XRCO Hall of Fame (2003). Blake's films usually feature original music scores by the composer Raoul Valve.  Blake has described his work as "erotic fashion," and his films usually include fetish, bondage, and lesbian imagery, often excluding heterosexual intercourse entirely. Blake's earliest films were primarily works of softcore erotica, however, and that sensibility still informs his pacing and style. Early films made by Blake soon after he came into his own as an independent director are fully explicit and usually combine heterosexual intercourse with lesbian imagery while including much less fetish and bondage content than his later films.  An interview with Blake is included in the "9 to 5 – Days in Porn" (2009) documentary film about the American porn industry.

Reception.

Blake's first major film, "Night Trips," (1989), was awarded the Silver Medal in the Non-Theatrical Release Category at the Worldfest-Houston International Film Festival. Andrew Blake holds the distinction of being the first adult director to win a film award at a mainstream international film festival.  Andrew Blake's films are characterized by high production values, artistic stylization, and rigorous technique. His style has been compared to that of the seminal fashion photographer Helmut Newton, and described as "decadent, lush, opulent, unfailingly arousing, moneyed and sophisticated."  Sex writer Violet Blue says of Blake's work: "It's a whole different genre of explicit erotic filmmaking evident from the first frame -- pure high fashion, glossy candyland fantasy. It is luxuriously designed from nip tip to toe. And it's stylish as hell."

Pop Culture.

Andrew Blake has had a significant impact on pop film culture. Blake was the first adult director to win a crossover award with Night Trips filmed in 1989, which won the Silver Award Non-Theatrical Release at the WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival. Blake featured Dita Von Tease in a full-length feature film Corsets & Upskirts, which featured her as a pinup and highlighted her interest in the fetish and kink lifestyle further elevating her career as the world leading fetish burlesque star. Blake has been on the forefront of pop culture embracing technology, such as the early adoption of Twitter in 2011, and helped usher film based cinematography into the digital era. Transferring his films to high-definition digital versions, Blake set the standard for high definition erotica.

See also.

The following listing includes directors also known for adult erotic films:

Andrew Blake (born 1948) is an American adult erotic film director and film producer. Blake has been inducted into both the AVN and XRCO Halls of Fame and is a medal recipient from the Worldfest-Houston International Film Festival for his first film NIGHT TRIPS.

Andrew Blake, eigentlich Paul Nevitt, (* 1947 in den USA) ist ein US-amerikanischer Pornofilmregisseur, Filmregisseur, Filmproduzent, Drehbuchautor und Art Director.


Geography.

The town of Rodenberg lies between the Deister, Süntel and Bückeberg ridges. The Rodenberger Aue and Steinaue streams flow through the town. The "old Rodenberg" hill, which gives the town its name, with its landmark windmill, rises to the west of the town. Since 1974, the parish of Rodenberg includes the formerly independent parish of Algesdorf. The neighbouring village of Grove, with its church, was amalgamated with Rodenberg in 1834.

History.

The neighbourhood of Rodenberg was already settled in prehistoric times, inter alia by the Celts and Saxons. This is also witnessed by some barrows in the vicinity. The name Rodenberg refers to a hill to the west of the town, and the name does not refer to a clearing but to the red colour of the hill: "roter Berg".  According to the earliest record of the town, the predecessors of the Counts of Schaumburg erected a castle or peel tower here in 930; unfortunately no more details are known.  It is presumed that the moated castle was established by Adolf IV, Count of Schaumburg between 1228 and 1240, and that the previous castle of 930 was located on the so-called "old Rodenberg" to the west of the town.  The current spelling of Rodenberg was first used in 1632. A wide variety of other spellings are recorded between 1317 and 1586.  The town was legally recognised as a settlement in 1250, and in 1615 as a town by Ernest, Count of Schaumburg. The line of Counts of Schaumburg was extinguished in 1640 on the death of Count Otto V, and in 1647 the town was absorbed by the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel (or Hesse-Cassel) - a position that was formally consolidated by the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648.  A widely known spa was established in 1718 and was very popular until 1787 when Landgrave William IX established a spa at the sulphur springs in neighbouring Bad Nenndorf.  In 1859 much of the town burned down. In the years that followed, the stones from the fortifications were recycled to various new buildings in the town and also in Bad Nenndorf.  When Hesse was annexed by Prussia in 1866, the Rinteln district (as it was called between 1866–1904) became part of the Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau, as it remained until it was incorporated into the province of Hanover following the local government reforms of 1932.  This part of Schaumburg also belongs to the Evangelical Lutheran Church district of Hanover.  Prior to the abolition of Government Districts in Lower Saxony in 2004, Rodenberg belonged to the district of Hanover.

Rodenberg is a town in the district of Schaumburg, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated on the northwestern edge of the Deister hills, approx. 10 km east of Stadthagen, and 27 km west of Hanover.

Rodenberg ist eine Stadt im Osten des Landkreises Schaumburg in Niedersachsen und gehört zur Samtgemeinde Rodenberg, deren Verwaltungssitz sie ist.


Operations.

"Soldatensender Calais" operated on the mediumwave band on 833 kHz (360 metres), 714 kHz (420 metres), and 612 kHz (490 metres), with an associated shortwave station "Kurzwellensender Atlantik" created to broadcast to U-boat crews. The station used a 500 kilowatt transmitter originally built for American broadcaster WJZ, in Newark, New Jersey. This transmitter had lain unused at the factory after the United States Federal Communications Commission imposed a 50 kW power limit on all U.S. stations, and so RCA was glad to sell it overseas and the British Secret Service bought it for £165,000. Codenamed Aspidistra, it was installed in a huge, underground bunker near Crowborough in Sussex, England, where it was briefly the world's largest medium wave station, perfect for deceptive "black" operation.  "Soldatensender Calais" operated from 6 p.m. local time to dawn. Unlike its predecessor "Gustav Siegfried Eins", the programmes were live from the purposely-built broadcast studio at Milton Bryan in Bedfordshire and presented by Agnes Bernelle using the codename "Vicky".  The method of propaganda used by "Soldatensender Calais" was described by Sefton Delmer, its creator, in his book, "Black Boomerang", as "cover, cover, dirt, cover, dirt"; that is, using good music and providing coverage of sports and other events of interest to a German serviceman, the station made that listener receptive to propaganda items aimed at decreasing morale. An example was a warning of confidence men swindling German soldiers being transferred from France to the Russian front. This approach could be compared to those used by Tokyo Rose and Axis Sally, without the heavy-handedness of the Axis programs. "Soldatensender Calais", as part of its cover, relayed speeches by Adolf Hitler and other Nazi officials.  During the D-Day invasion of 6 June 1944, "Soldatensender Calais" broadcast information that was intended to impress German intelligence officers that the invasion area was wider than it actually was. After the Pas de Calais area was overrun, the station changed its callsign to "Soldatensender West".  "Soldatensender"'s broadcast was repeated in print the next day in the PWE/OSS "Nachrichten für die Truppe" air-dropped newspaper for German troops.  The station closed on 30 April 1945 without any official announcement.

Similar operations.

Other clandestine radio stations operated by the Political Warfare Executive and its forerunners during the war included "Das wahre Deutschland" (G.1), "Sender der Europäischen Revolution" (G.2), "Gustav Siegfried Eins" (G.3), "Wehrmachtssender Nord" (G.5) and the "German Priest" (G.7) station.  The United States Army maintained a similar operation, Radio 1212 also known as "Sender 1212" or "Nachtsender 1212".  The Soviet-based German People's Radio also known as "Deutscher Volkssender" was inspired, in part, by Soldatensender Calais.

Soldatensender Calais (G.9) (, "Soldiers' Radio Calais") was a British black propaganda broadcaster during the Second World War operated by the Political Warfare Executive. It pretended to be a station of the German military broadcasting network. The station was in operation between 14 November 1943 and 30 April 1945, when it ceased operations.

Der Soldatensender Calais war ein britischer deutschsprachiger Propagandasender des Political Warfare Executive während des Zweiten Weltkrieges. Das Programm wurde, gemeinsam mit dem des Deutschen Kurzwellensenders Atlantik von der Sendeanlage Aspedistra in der Nähe vom Crowborough (South East England) abgestrahlt.


Biography.

Al-Mustansir was born in Cairo on 16th Jumada II, 420 AH, to Ali az-Zahir and Rasad, a black slave from Nubia. At the age of only eight months he was declared the heir of his father. His name was Abu Tamim Ma‘ad, surnamed al-Mustansir bil-Lah ("The Asker Of Victory From God"). He ascended to the Fatimid Caliphate throne on 15th Shaban, 427/June 13, 1036 at the age of. During the early years of his Caliphate, the state affairs were administered by his mother. His rule lasted for 60 years, the longest of all the caliphs, either in Egypt or elsewhere in Islamic states. However, Fatimid power was confined to Egypt due to conquests of Seljuks in the Levant and Normans in Sicily and Malta. Al-Mustansir was considered incapable and as such his court was dominated by military strongmen and his mother's favourite officials, while the treasury was exhausted by factional infighting.  He had constructed a special mihrab at one of a pillar in the Mosque of Ibn Tulun. Atop the mihrab, his name is engraved along with the Shahada commonly recited by the public in Fatimid era ending with the phrase 'Ali-un-Vali-ul-lah'.

Al-Mustansir's court.

Prominent Dai/Vizir of his era are as under: Moulai Abadullah and Syedi Nuruddin were two Indian who visited Imam Al-Mustansir Billah, Egypt. He joined the Ismaili faith under Fatimid Dai Mu'ayyad fi'l-Din al-Shirazi, and went to India to propagate the faith.

Architecture.

Prominent architecture of his era are as under:

Famine.

Between 457/1065 and 464/1072, famine degraded conditions in Egypt from bad to worse. Meanwhile, in 454/1062 and again in 459/1067, the struggle between the Turkish and Sudanese soldiery deteriorated into open warfare, ending in a victory for the Turks.  During this same period, Berber nomadic tribes from lower Egypt deliberately aggravated the distress by ravaging the countryside, destroying the embankments and canals of the Nile. The ten thousand animals that al-Mustansir's stables once held reportedly deteriorated to the point where only three thin horses were left; it is said that eventually al-Mustansir alone possessed a horse, and that when he rode out, the courtiers followed on foot, having no beast to carry them; it is also said that his escort once fainted from hunger as it accompanied him through the streets. As long as the calamity lasted, the condition of the country continued to decline. The protracted famine was followed inevitably by plague; whole districts were absolutely denuded of population and house after house lay empty.

Turkish mercenaries.

Concurrently, the Turkish mercenaries had drained the treasury; many of the works of art and valuables of all sorts in the palace were sold to satisfy their demands---often they themselves were the purchasers, at merely nominal prices, and resold the articles thus gained at a profit. Emeralds valued at 300,000 dinars were bought by one Turkish general for 500 dinars, and in one fortnight of the year 460/1068 articles to the value of 30,000,000 dinars were sold off to provide pay for the Turks. The precious library, which had been rendered available to the public and was one of the attractions for many who visited Cairo, was scattered; the books were torn up, thrown away, or used to light fires. At length, the Turks began fighting amongst themselves. Nasir al-Dawla ibn Hamdan, the general of the Turks, had invested the city, which was defended by the rival faction of the Turkish guard; after burning part of Fustat and defeating the defenders, he entered as conqueror. When he reached the palace, he found al-Mustansir lodged in rooms which had been stripped bare, waited on by only three slaves, and subsisting on two loaves which were sent him daily by the daughters of Ibn Babshand, the grammarian.  The victorious Turks dominated Cairo, held the successive viziers in subjection, treated al-Mustansir with contempt, and used their power to deplete the treasury by enhancing their pay to nearly twenty times its former figure. Nasir al-Dawla became so overbearing and tyrannical in his conduct that he provoked even his own followers, and so at length he was assassinated in 466/1074. Unfortunately, this left the city in a worse condition than ever, for it was now at the mercy of the various Turkish factions, who behaved no better than brigands. Conditions in Egypt continued to deteriorate, and unabated violence raged in the streets and countryside alike.

Descendants.

Using the genealogical information of the members of the Fatimid dynasty imprisoned by Saladin, and contemporary documents, the historian Paul E. Walker estimates that al-Mustansir had "at the minimum seventeen sons whose names we can recover". Indeed, he suggests that it was precisely the great number of offspring he sired during his long reign that created the succession crisis after his death.

Abū Tamīm Ma‘ad al-Mustanṣir bi-llāh ( ; July 5, 1029 – January 10, 1094) was the eighth Fatimid Caliph from 1036 until 1094. He was one of the longest reigning Muslim rulers.

Abu Tamim Maadd ibn az-Zahir (; * 2. Juli 1029; † 29. Dezember 1094) war von 1036 bis zu seinem Tod unter dem Herrschernamen al-Mustansir billah (), in der deutschsprachigen Literatur kurz al-Mustansir genannt, der achte Kalif der Fatimiden, sowie der achtzehnte und letzte gemeinsame Imam der Schia der Ismailiten vor deren Spaltung.


History.

Evidence of the earliest inhabitants in this area comes from the settlements and burial grounds of the Neolithic Gumelniţa, Cucuteni-Trypillian and Usatovo cultures, as well as from the tumuli and hoards of the Bronze Age Proto-Indo-Europeans. In the 1st millennium B.C. Milesian Greeks founded colonies along the northern coast of the Black Sea, including the towns of Olbia, Tyras, Niconium, Panticapaeum, and Chersonesus. The Greeks left behind painted vessels, ceramics, sculptures, inscriptions, arts and crafts that indicate the prosperity of their ancient civilisation.  The culture of Scythian tribes inhabiting the Black Sea littoral steppes in the first millennium B.C. has left artefacts in settlements and burial grounds, including weapons, bronze cauldrons, other utensils, and adornments. By the beginning of the 1st millennium A.D. the Sarmatians displaced the Scythians. In the 3rd–4th centuries A.D. a tribal alliance, represented by the items of Chernyakhov culture, developed. From the middle of the first millennium the formation of the Slavic people began. In the 9th century the eastern Slavs united into a state with Kiev as its centre. The Khazars, Polovtsy and Pechenegs were the Slavs' neighbours during different times. Archeological evidence of the period of the 9th–14th centuries survives in materials from the settlements and cities of Kievan Rus': Belgorod, Caffa-Theodosia, and Berezan Island.  The Mongols took over the Black Sea littoral in the 13th century.  The Grand Duchy of Lithuania acquired the area at the beginning of the 15th century.  In 1593 the Ottoman Empire set up in the area what became known as its Dnieper Province (Özü Eyalet), unofficially known as the "Khanate of Ukraine". Russian historiography refers to the area from 1791 as the Ochakov Oblast. The territory of the Odessa oblast passed to Russian control in 1791 in the course of the Russian southern expansion towards the Black Sea at the end of the 18th century.  After the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia the area became part of the Ukrainian People's Republic (1917-1918), but soon succumbed first to the Russian Volunteer Army (part of the White movement) and then to the Russian Bolshevik Red Army. By 1920 the Soviet authorities had secured the territory of Odessa Oblast, which became part of the Ukrainian SSR. The oblast was established on 27 February 1932 from five districts: Odessa Okruha, Pervomaisk Okruha, Kirovohrad Okruha, Mykolaiv Okruha, and Kherson Okruha.  In 1937 the Central Executive Committee of the USSR split off the eastern portions of the Odessa Oblast to form the Mykolaiv Oblast.  During World War II Axis forces conquered the area and Romania occupied the oblast and administered it as part of the Transnistria Governorate (1941-1944). After the war the Soviet administration reestablished the oblast with its pre-war borders.  Odessa Oblast expanded in 1954 to absorb Izmail Oblast (also known as the Budjak region of Bessarabia), formed in 1940 as a result of the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina (from Romania), when Northern and Southern parts of Bessarabia were given to the Ukrainian SSR.  During the 1991 referendum, 85.38% of votes in Odessa Oblast favored the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine. A survey conducted in December 2014 by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology found that 2.3% of the oblast's population supported their region joining Russia, 91.5% did not support the idea, and the rest were undecided or did not respond. A poll reported by Alexei Navalny and conducted in September 2014 found similar results.

Geography.

The country's largest oblast by area, it occupies an area of around. It is characterised by largely flat steppes divided by the estuary of the Dniester river. Its Black Sea coast comprises numerous sandy beaches, estuaries and lagoons. The region's soils are renowned for their fertility, and intensive agriculture is the mainstay of the local economy. The southwest has many orchards and vineyards, while arable crops are grown throughout the region.

Economy.

Significant branches of the oblast's economy are:  The region's industrial capability is principally concentrated in and around Odessa.

Demographics.

The oblast's population (as of 2004) is 2.4 million people, nearly 40% of whom live in the city of Odessa.  Significant Bulgarian (6.1%) and Romanian (5.0%) minorities reside in the province. It has the highest proportion of Jews of any oblast in Ukraine (although smaller than the Autonomous City of Kiev) and there is a small Greek community in the city of Odessa.  Bulgarians and Romanians represent 21% and 13% respectively, of the population in the salient of Budjak, within Odessa oblast.

Religion.

The dominant religion in Odessa Oblast is Eastern Orthodox Christianity, professed by 84% of the population. Another 8% declares to be non-religious and 6% are unaffiliated generic Christians. Adherents of Catholicism and Protestantism make up 0.5% of the population respectively.  The Orthodox community of Odessa Oblast is divided as follows:

Administrative divisions.

The Odessa Oblast is administratively subdivided into 26 "raions" (districts) and 7 municipalities which are directly subordinate to the oblast government - (Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi, Chornomorsk, Izmail, Podilsk, Teplodar, Yuzhne and the administrative center of the oblast, Odessa).

Notable people.

One of the most famous Odessits is who was a universal sportsman excelling in cycling, boxing, swimming and played football for the Odessa British Athletic Club. Utochkin had challenged a steam-powered tram while running, on a bicycle he beat a galloping horse, while on roller skates he was passing a bicyclist. The next stage for him was to conquest skies. Utochkin managed to buy an airplane from a local banker and completed dozens of exhibition flights. Eventually, he managed to assemble his own Farman-type airplane. In Kiev, Utochkin was demonstrating his piloting skills in front of some 50,000 people, among which was a future creator of helicopters Igor Sikorsky.  In the Southern Palmyra were also born a poet Anna Akhmatova, former NASA scientist Nicholas E. Golovin who worked with the Apollo program, as well as the founder of jazz in the Soviet Union Leonid Utyosov.

Odessa Oblast (also known as Odesa Oblast;, "Odes’ka oblast’",, "Odesskaya oblast’", Bulgarian Одеска област) is an oblast (province) of southwestern Ukraine, located along the northern coast of the Black Sea. Its administrative center is the city of Odessa ().

Die Oblast Odessa (; ) ist eine von 25 Verwaltungseinheiten der Ukraine (Oblaste der Ukraine) und hat etwa 2,4 Millionen Einwohner (2014).


Building.

The building is located on / behind the Hotel Imperial near the Ringstraße boulevard and the Wien River, between Bösendorferstraße and Karlsplatz. However, since Bösendorferstraße is a relatively small street, the building is better known as being between Karlsplatz and Kärntner Ring (part of Ringstraße loop). It was erected as the new concert hall run by the, on a piece of land provided by Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria in 1863.  The plans were designed by Danish architect Theophil Hansen in the Neoclassical style of an ancient Greek temple, including a concert hall and a smaller chamber music hall. The building was inaugurated on 6 January 1870. A major donor was Nikolaus Dumba, industrialist and liberal politician of Greek descent, whose name the Austrian government gave to one of the streets surrounding the. The (Great Hall), or (Golden Hall), is about long, wide, and high. It has 1,744 seats and standing room for 300. The Skandalkonzert of 1913 was given there, and it is the venue for the annual Vienna New Year's Concert.  The Great Hall's lively acoustics are primarily based on Hansen's intuition, as he could not rely on any studies on architectural acoustics. The room's rectangular shape and proportions, its boxes and sculptures allow early and numerous sound reflections.  The Hall originally included a historic pipe organ built by Friedrich Ladegast. Its first organ recital was held by Anton Bruckner in 1872. The present-day instrument was originally installed in 1907 by the Austrian firm of Rieger Orgelbau, highly esteemed by musicians such as Franz Schmidt or Marcel Dupré, and rebuilt in 2011.  Since 2001, the building has been undergoing renovation, and several new rehearsal halls have been installed in the basement.

Halls.

The names of the six halls refer to gold, Johannes Brahms, glass, metal, stone and wood respectively.

The (; Viennese Music Association), commonly shortened to, is a concert hall in the Innere Stadt borough of Vienna, Austria. It is the home of the Vienna Philharmonic orchestra.

Die Dickkopffalter (Hesperiidae) sind eine Familie der Schmetterlinge. Sie kommen weltweit, außer in Neuseeland, mit etwa 4000 Arten und derzeit über 560 Gattungen vor. Ihr Hauptverbreitungsgebiet sind die Tropen, besonders die Neotropis. Namensgebend für die Familie ist der breite Kopf der Tiere. Die Hesperiidae werden oft als einzige Familie der Überfamilie Hesperioidea betrachtet, heute aber häufiger in die Überfamilie Papilionoidea eingegliedert.


Early life.

According to the saga, Sverre was born in 1151 to Gunnhild and her husband Unås, a comb maker from the Faroes. When Sverre was five, the family moved to the Faroes where Sverre was raised in the household of Unås' brother Roe, bishop of the Faroes on Kirkjubøargarður in Kirkjubøur. It was here that Sverre studied for the priesthood and was ordained. The priest school of Kirkjubøur must have been of a high standard, for Sverre was later described as very well educated. The legend says that he was hidden in a cave near the village. This cave actually exists and gave the mountain Sverrihola (303 m, "Sverre's cave") on the south tip of Streymoy its name.  Sverre, however, was not suited for a priestly life. The saga states that he had several dreams which he interpreted as a sign that he was destined for greater things. Further, in 1175, his mother revealed that Sverre was really the son of King Sigurd Munn. In the following year, Sverre travelled to Norway to seek his destiny.

Paternity.

The tale told in Sverre's saga is the official version. Historians have questioned the veracity of it, especially with regard to Sverre's alleged paternity. Some historians have considered his claim to be King Sigurd's son to be false, as did many of his contemporaries. Others have believed the paternal claim to be true, while most historians have found that the paternal question cannot be given a definite answer. Although the fact that kings fathered illegitimate sons was taken for granted, other facts indicate that Sverre was in his early thirties when he came to Norway, such as the age of his own sons and nephews. It has been cited against Sverre's claim that according to Canon law, one had to be at least 30 years old to be eligible for the priesthood. If Sverre was 30 years old when he became a priest, this would place his birth no later than 1145, making his paternal claim impossible, as Sigurd Munn was born in 1133. This particular objection has lost credence as it has become clear that this age limit was routinely ignored in Scandinavia at the time. However, other objections remain, such as the fact that Sverre consistently refused to undergo an ordeal by fire to prove his claims. At the time, such a trial was routine for new claimants to the throne, and belief in its efficacy seems to have been universal; yet Sverre refused to undergo it. If Sverre's claim was false, however, he would lack royal legitimacy, dooming his plans to failure. Regardless, his motivation is clear: to capture the throne of Norway, whether he could prove royal blood or not. After all, Norway had seen other claimants, since Harald Gille, whose paternity was equally questionable.  The fact that Sigurd Munn's daughter Cecilia acknowledged Sverre as the son of Sigurd is inconclusive. Sverre's actions offered her a welcome possibility to divorce from the marriage with Folkvid the Lawspeaker, into which she claimed to have been forced by Erling Skakke.  Support from Earl Birger Brosa of Sweden is more a sign of pragmatic politics on the part of the Swedes, as their ally party in Norway needed a new leader and had chosen Sverre. Sverre was not the Earl's first choice, however. They had first supported Øystein Møyla, who had died at the Battle of Re in 1177. The Swedish dynastic lines were themselves engaged in civil war, and the current rulers of the family after king Erik were at war with the Danish king Valdemar. Erling Skakke had submitted to Valdemar some decades earlier, and it was beneficial for the Swedes at the time to support the opponents of Erling's regime, namely Sverre.

Norway in 1176.

In 1176, Norway was slowly recovering from decades of multiple civil wars. The causes were largely due to the lack of any clear succession laws. According to the old customs, all the king's sons, legitimate or illegitimate, had equal right to the throne. It was customary for brothers to rule the kingdom together, but when quarrels arose, war was frequently the result.  Sigurd Munn, claimed by Sverre as his father, had been slain by his brother Inge Krokrygg in 1155. Sigurd's son Håkon Herdebrei had been chosen to be king by his father's followers. The conflict was now a regional conflict, with King Inge having the strongest support in Viken, while most of Håkon's followers were from Trøndelag. Inge Krokrygg fell in 1161. His party then took the five-year-old Magnus Erlingsson as king. Magnus was the son of Erling Skakke and Kristin, daughter of King Sigurd Jorsalfar. In 1162, at the Battle of Veøy, Håkon Herdebrei fell and his faction began to fall apart. In 1164 Magnus was crowned by Øystein Erlendsson, Archbishop of Nidaros. With the Church and most of the aristocracy on his side, Magnus' kingship seemed secure. Several uprisings followed, but they were all suppressed. Erling Skakke had been regent during his son's minority and continued to be the country's real ruler even after Magnus had come of age.

Sverre meets the Birkebeiners.

Thus when Sverre came to Norway he found the prospects for a successful uprising to be small. Distraught, he travelled east and came to Östergötland in Sweden just before Christmas. There he met with the local ruler, Birger Brosa, who was married to Sigurd Munn's sister, Brigit Haraldsdotter. Sverre revealed to Birger Brosa his claim to the throne, but Birger was at first unwilling to give any aid. He was already supporting another group, the Birkebeiners — the Birchlegs. This group had risen in 1174 under the leadership of Øystein Møyla who claimed to be the son of King Øystein Haraldsson. They had received the name Birkebeiners because their poverty led some of them to wind the bark of the birch about their legs, instead of wearing shoes. But in January 1177, the Birkebeiners met a crushing defeat at the Battle of Re and Øystein fell. Sverre met with the remnants in Värmland. After some initial doubts, Sverre let himself be persuaded to become the Birkebeiners’ next leader.

Rise to power.

Upon Sverre's initial contact, the Birkebeiners had been reduced to a ragtag army of brigands and vagabonds with no more than 70 men, according to the saga. Many regard Sverre's achievement of forging them into a force of skilled and professional soldiers as proof of his leadership qualities.

Difficult years.

During the early years as leader of the Birkebeiners, Sverre and his men were almost constantly on the move. The Birkebeiners were generally viewed as troublemakers with little chance of success by the general populace, who most of all desired peace. Although peasant gatherings were no match for the battle hardened Birkebeiners, Magnus or Erling Skakke frequently had the Birkebeiner on the run.  In June 1177, Sverre first led his men to Trøndelag where Sverre was proclaimed as king at. Since this was the traditional place to choose a king, the event carried important symbolic weight. The Birkebeiners then moved south to Hadeland, where they were forced northwards again. Sverre then decided to turn west, attempting to take Bergen by surprise. At Voss, however, the Birkebeiners were ambushed by the local peasants. Although the Birkebeiners were victorious, the surprise element on Bergen was eliminated, forcing the group eastwards again. After almost freezing to death on Sognefjell, they wintered in Østerdal.  The next spring, after a short stay in Viken, Sverre and the Birkebeiners returned to Trøndelag. The Birkebeiners now shifted to a more confrontational strategy. However, an attack on Nidaros ended in defeat at the ("Slaget på Hatthammeren"). After fleeing south, they met Magnus' army in Ringerike, with the skirmish ending in a tactical victory for the Birkebeiners. Encouraged, the Birkebeiners returned to Trøndelag and managed to subdue the region enough to stay in Nidaros during the winter.  In the spring of 1179, Magnus and Erling Skakke attacked Nidaros, forcing another apparent retreat. Confident that the Birkebeiners had again fled southwards, Magnus and his men were complacent. Sverre, however, had turned around at Gauldal and marched again upon the city. The two armies met 19 June in the Battle of Kalvskinnet. Erling Skakke was killed in a battle that ended in a clear victory for Sverre. This victory secured Sverre's hold on Trøndelag.

Victory over the Heklungs.

After Sverre's victory at Kalvskinnet, the war changed somewhat in character. The Trønders accepted Sverre as their king; the two sides were now much more equal in power. At some point, Magnus' party acquired the nickname ("Heklunger"). "Hekle" is Old Norse for hood and is here probably meant to imply the traditional monk garb. The Heklungs thus probably got their name from their close connection with the church.  Several battles now followed. Magnus Erlingsson again attacked Trøndelag in the spring of 1180, this time reinforced by conscripts from western Norway. But in the ("Slaget på Ilevollene"), just outside Nidaros, the Heklungs were again defeated and Magnus fled to Denmark. With Magnus out of the country, Sverre could sail south and occupy Bergen, but his hold on the region remained weak.  Determined to achieve a decisive victory against the Birkebeiners, Magnus returned with his fleet the next year. The two forces met at sea 31 May 1181 in the Battle of Nordnes. The battle ended in a tactical victory for the Birkebeiners; the Heklungs fled when Magnus was mistakenly believed to have been killed. With his men in poor shape, Sverre decided to withdraw to Trøndelag. Some attempts at negotiation were now made, but these soon broke down. Magnus would not accept Sverre as co-king with equal status, and Sverre could not accept becoming Magnus' vassal.  With Magnus controlling western Norway from his seat at Bergen, it became problematic for Sverre to keep his men supplied. Sverre therefore led his men south to Viken, a firm Heklung stronghold. He could therefore let his men plunder here with little damage to his cause. However, Magnus exploited Sverre's absence well. In November he raided Trøndelag and managed to seize and burn the Birkebeiner fleet. Sverre had to return or risk losing his one secure foothold.  During summer 1182, Magnus made an attempt to take Nidaros by siege, but was repulsed with grave losses when the Birkebeiners launched a surprise night attack. Sverre now started an extensive shipbuilding program. Without a fleet, he could have no hopes of expanding his influence further south. In spring 1183 Sverre attacked Bergen with parts of his new fleet. Avoiding detection by the enemy scouts, he caught the Heklungs off guard, seizing their entire fleet. Magnus fled to Denmark, leaving crown and sceptre behind.  In the sea battles of medieval Scandinavia, the side with the largest and highest ships would usually have an advantage, since this meant the crew could attack the enemy from above with projectiles and other weapons. Sverre built the largest ship afloat at the time, the "". Because of its great size, the seaworthiness of the "Mariasuda" was rather poor and it would only be useful within the narrow fjords. Either because of luck or good strategy such a situation would soon arise.  Early spring 1184, Magnus returned to Viken from Denmark with new ships. In April he sailed north towards Bergen. At about the same time, Sverre had gone to Sogn to put down a local uprising and was still there when Magnus came to Bergen in June. After chasing out the few Birkebeiners there, Magnus set sail again, having heard news of Sverre's current position. The two fleets met 15 June at Fimreite in the long and narrow Sognefjord. The Battle of Fimreite proved to be the final struggle between Birkebeiners and Heklungs. Magnus had several large ships, but none as huge as the "Mariasuda". While the "Mariasuda" held up half of the enemy fleet, the rest attacked the outlying enemy ships. Panic began to spread as the Heklungs fled aboard their larger ships. These ships soon became overloaded and began to sink. Many of the wounded and tired men could not keep themselves afloat and drowned, including King Magnus. Most of the Heklung leadership fell there, along with a huge number of men at both sides. Leaderless, the Heklungs were now broken as a political party. Sverre could now finally, after a six-year struggle, claim to be the sole and uncontested king of Norway.

Troubled reign.

Now that the dissatisfied priest and his band of vagrants and outcasts had become king and rulers of Norway, Sverre worked to consolidate his power. He placed his loyal men in high positions throughout the kingdom and negotiated marriage alliances between the old and new nobility. Sverre himself married Margareta, daughter of Erik the Saint and sister of King Knut Eriksson of Sweden.  Although Norway had seen several conflicts in the previous decades, the victor had reconciled with his opponents. Reconciliation in Sverre's case, however, proved to be difficult. It was a long war with more casualties than previous conflicts. Most of the older noble dynasties had lost men and thirsted for vengeance. Further, that many people of non-noble origin were now elevated to noble standing was difficult for many to accept. Peace was not to last long.

Kuvlungs and Øyskjeggene.

Autumn 1185 the ("Kuvlungene") rose in Viken. Their leader, Jon Kuvlung, was a former monk and was claimed to be the son of Inge Krogrygg. This group was in many ways the direct successor of the Heklungs, with many of its members coming from former Heklung families. The Kuvlungs soon gained control of eastern and western Norway, the old Heklung strongholds.  In autumn 1186, the Kuvlungs attacked Nidaros. This offensive took Sverre by surprise; he took refuge in the recently constructed stone castle Sion. The Kuvlungs, unable to take the castle, were forced to retreat. In 1188 Sverre sailed south with a large fleet. They first met at Tønsberg, but neither side dared to offer battle. The Kuvlungs slipped away to Bergen. Sverre attacked Bergen just before Christmas. Jon Kuvlung was killed, which ended the Kuvlung rising. Some minor uprisings followed, but these never rose above banditry and were suppressed on a local scale.  The next serious threat came in 1193 with the (the Isle Beards). This group's pretender to the throne was Sigurd, a child claimed to be the bastard son of Magnus Erlingsson. The real leader was Hallkjell Jonsson who was Magnus’ brother-in-law. Conspiring with the Earl of Orkney, Harald Maddadsson, Hallkjell gathered most of his men on the Orkney and Shetland Islands, hence the name of the group. After establishing themselves in Viken, the Øyskjeggene sailed on to Bergen. Although they occupied the city itself and the surrounding regions, a force of Birkebeiners held on in Sverresborg castle. In spring 1194 Sverre sailed south to confront the Øyskjeggene. The two fleets met 3 April in the Battle of Florvåg ("slaget ved Florvåg"). Here the battle experience of the Birkebeiner veterans proved to be decisive. Hallkjell fell with most of his men.

Sverre and the church.

The Church of Norway had been organized under the Archbishopric of Nidaros in 1152. Øystein Erlendsson, who had become archbishop in 1161, had been one of Magnus Erlingsson's main supporters. In return, the church had secured its position as an independent institution and also gained several other privileges.  Øystein had returned to Nidaros from England in 1183, and during his last years a state of truce existed between church and king. When Øystein died on 26 January 1188, Eirik Ivarsson, Bishop of Stavanger, was elected as his successor. Sverre now probably hoped that his relationship with the church could be normalised. He therefore approached Eirik with hopes of being crowned — the definite proof of recognition. However, in Eirik's eyes, Sverre was little more than a usurper and king-murderer.  The situation now escalated into an open breach as Sverre began building up a list of privileges that were contrary to the church law made by St. Olaf, the traditional founder of the Norwegian Church. Eirik on his side preached against the king and his men, and sent letters of complaint to the Pope, but in the short term his offensive weapons were few. In 1190 Sverre attempted to force the archbishop into submission, claiming that Eirik had broken the law by having 90 armed men in his service. According to law, the archbishop's guard was limited to 30 men. Rather than submit to the king's will, Eirik fled to Lund where the Danish archbishop had his seat. From there he sent a delegation to Rome asking the pope for advice.  With the archbishop absent, Sverre tightened his grip on the bishops, and on Nikolas Arnesson in particular. Nikolas was the half-brother of Inge Krokrygg and had become bishop of Oslo in 1190 against Sverre's wish. After the destruction of the Øyskjeggs at Florvåg, Sverre arranged a meeting with Nikolas where he claimed to have proof that the bishop had colluded with the Øyskjeggs. The king accused Nikolas of treason and threatened severe punishment. Nikolas submitted, and on 29 June, together with the other bishops, he crowned Sverre as King of Norway. Sverre's domestic priest was elected bishop of Bergen.  Meanwhile, archbishop Eirik had at last received a reply from Rome. In a letter dated 15 June 1194, Pope Celestine III laid out the foundational rights of the Norwegian Church supporting Eirik on every point. Empowered by this letter, Eirik could take the step of excommunicating Sverre and order the Norwegian bishops to join him in exile in Denmark.  The following spring, Sverre sent the still loyal Tore, bishop of Hamar, to Rome to plead his case before the pope. He returned in early 1197, according to the saga, carrying a papal letter which annulled the excommunication of Sverre. In Denmark, Tore is said to have fallen ill and died under suspicious circumstances, but not before pawning the papal letter. The pawnbrokers then travelled to Norway and delivered it to Sverre who used it for everything it was worth. No other sources confirm this story and most historians now agree that the letter was forged.  With the death of Pope Celestine in January 1198, the conflict entered a short lull until the new pope, Innocent III, had brought himself up to date, but then the conflict was further escalated. In October, Innocent III placed Norway under interdict and in letters to Eirik accused Sverre of forgery. He also sent letters to admonish neighboring kings to dispossess Sverre. They did the contrary: Sweden continued actively to support the Birkebeiners and John of England sent mercenaries to help Sverre. In 1200 Innocent found it necessary to warn the Archbishop of Canterbury not to accept further gifts from Sverre.  Around this time someone close to Sverre wrote a speech against the bishops, "En tale mot biskopene". In this work, the unknown author discussed the relationship between King and Church. By referring to well known theological works such as the "Decretum Gratiani" and the writings of Augustine of Hippo, the author attempted to prove that the excommunication of Sverre was unjust and thus not binding. The author also tried to defend the right of Sverre to appoint bishops. To support this view he had to interpret Norwegian law, since the Church had long considered this to be simony. By now Sverre had his hands full with the church-supported Bagler rising, and the direct struggle with the church became a sideshow, at least for him personally.

The Bagler war.

During spring 1196 the Bagler party was formed at Halør in Denmark in opposition against Sverre. Their leaders were Nikolas Arnesson, the nobleman Reidar Sendemann from Viken and Sigurd Jarlsson, a bastard son of Erling Skakke. Eirik the Archbishop also gave his support. As their king, they chose Inge Magnusson, supposedly the son of Magnus Erlingsson. They then sailed back to Norway.  Sverre happened to be in Viken, and the two forces soon encountered each other, although no major battles were fought. Sverre gave his eldest son, Sigurd Lavard, the responsibility of guarding a ballista he had had built. However, the Baglers launched a surprise night attack during which the ballista was destroyed and Sigurd and his men were chased away. Sverre was furious and never gave his son a command again. After some more indecisive fighting, Sverre sailed north to Trondheim, where he spent the winter. The Baglers had Inge hailed as king on Borgarting and soon established a firm control over the Viken region, with Oslo as their main seat.  In spring 1197, Sverre called out the leidang from the northern and western parts of the country, and in May he was able to sail south to Viken with more than 7000 men, a considerable force. The Birkebeiners attacked Oslo 26 July, and after many casualties on both sides, the Baglers were forced inland. Sverre now spent some time war-taxing the region, but with his leidang troops close to mutiny, Sverre withdrew to Bergen where he had decided to spend the winter. This was to be a near fatal mistake. The Baglers had meanwhile travelled north to Trøndelag by land where they had entered Nidaros with little opposition. The garrison at Sverresborg held fast for a while until their commander Torstein Kugad changed sides and let the Baglers into the castle. The Baglers had Sverresborg completely dismantled. Sverre's home region was now in enemy hands.  The year 1198 was to be the nadir of Sverre's fortunes. In May Sverre launched his attempt to recapture Trøndelag. This time Sverre failed to achieve surprise and the Birkebeiner fleet consisted mostly of smaller ships. In the sea battle that followed, the Birkebeiners were soundly beaten. In the aftermath of this battle the Baglers further consolidated their hold on Trøndelag and many went over to what they believed to be the winning side.  After his defeat, Sverre limped back to Bergen. He was soon followed by a numerically superior Bagler army under the leadership of Nikolas Arnesson and Hallvard of Såstad. Sverre continued to hold Bergenhus fortress. This castle proved to be impregnable, giving the Birkebeiners a secure base of operation. The following summer was to be called the "Bergen’s summer" and was dominated by indecisive skirmishing in the Bergen area. On 11 August the Baglers set fire to Bergen. The destruction was complete, even the churches were burnt down. Facing starvation, Sverre slipped away with most of his men to Trøndelag.  In Trøndelag, most of the population was still loyal to Sverre, and many of those who had joined the Baglers now changed sides again. Sverre was also able to play on the Baglers' brutality at Bergen. The Trønders promised to provide Sverre with a new fleet, in all 8 large ships were constructed and several transport ships were converted. The Baglers sailed into the Trondheimsfjord in early June. On 18 June 1199 the two fleets met at the Battle of Strindafjord ("slaget på Strindfjorden"). Here Sverre won a crushing victory, and the surviving Baglers fled to Denmark.  Sverre could now take control over Viken and prepared to spend the winter in Oslo, but the countryside remained largely hostile. Early the next year, a spontaneous uprising took place as huge numbers of people started drifting towards Oslo to throw the Birkebeiners out. This peasant army was untrained and without organization and was no match for the battle-hardened Birkebeiners. In a battle on 6 March 1200 the peasants were defeated piecemeal. However, the Birkebeiners' grip on the region was still weak, and Sverre decided to sail back to Bergen.  With Sverre gone, the Baglers could return in force from Denmark and soon they had re-established their hold on Eastern Norway. The two sides then spent a year raiding each other's territories with no lasting gains for either side, although the Birkebeiners had the upper hand at sea.  In Spring 1201 Sverre sailed out from Bergen with a large leidang force in what would be his last campaign season. With this army he could demand war taxes without opposition on both sides of the Oslofjord during the summer. In September he set up camp at Tønsberg and laid siege to Tønsberg Fortress, which was garrisoned by Reidar Sendemann and his men. The siege dragged on because the other Bagler leaders dared not send a relief force and the garrison did not fall for any of Sverre's tricks. At last, on 25 January, Reidar and his men surrendered, and Sverre decided to sail back to Bergen.  During the return journey Sverre fell ill, and by the time they reached Bergen, the king was dying. On his death bed, Sverre appointed his sole living son, Håkon, as his heir and successor and in a letter advised him to seek reconciliation with the Church. Sverre died 9 March 1202.

Sverre Sigurdsson () (c. 1145/1151 – 9 March 1202) was the King of Norway from 1184 to 1202. Many consider him one of the most important rulers in Norwegian history. He assumed power as the leader of the rebel party known as the Birkebeiner in 1177, during their struggle against King Magnus Erlingsson. After Magnus fell at the Battle of Fimreite in 1184, Sverre ruled as sole king of Norway. Differences with the Church, however, led to his excommunication in 1194. Another civil war began against the church-supported Baglers, which lasted beyond Sverre's death in 1202.

Sverre Sigurdsson oder Sverrir, Sverri (* um 1151 in Norwegen; † 8. März 1202 in Bergen, Norwegen) war von 1177 bis 1202 norwegischer König.


Training and testing.

Testing consists of a written exam and a practical test (also known as a check ride). The check ride is divided into an oral component to verify that the applicant understands the theory of instrument flying and an actual flight to ensure the pilot possesses the practical skills required for safe IFR flight.  For most private pilots, the most significant value of flying under IFR is the ability to fly in instrument meteorological conditions (such as inside clouds or days with poor visibility). Additionally, all flights operating in Class A airspace, defined in the US as the airspace from 18,000 MSL up to FL 600 (roughly 60,000 feet), must be conducted under IFR. In the United States, an instrument rating is required when operating under special visual flight rules (SVFR) at night.

Requirements.

Requirements for Instrument Rating in the United States are listed in section 61.65 of the Federal Aviation Regulation are:  The Canadian license VFR-Over-the-Top (VFR OTT) allows private as well as commercial pilots to cross IMC areas when start and end of the trip is performed under VFR conditions.  In the UK, private pilots can attend a less intensive training to the Instrument Rating (Restricted) rating, restricted to the national airspace. This does not confer the privileges of a full Instrument Rating, but allows flight in IMC outside class A airspace, and flight on a SVFR clearance with in-flight visibility below 10 km (but more than 3 km).  An instrument rating test can be taken in either single or multi engine aircraft, with the qualification awarded being known as an SEIR or MEIR. A pilot may be qualified to fly multi engine aircraft, but only hold a SEIR - in which case he/she would only be allowed to fly SE aircraft in IMC. To upgrade to a MEIR, further training and another check ride would be required. An MEIR holder is automatically granted SEIR privileges.  In addition, under EASA, an instrument rating is issued as either single pilot (SP) or multi pilot (MP) and must be re-validated separately every 12 months. Typically, a pilot will get their first SP MEIR on a light piston twin, then when they move to an airline, they will get a MP MEIR as part of their type rating training. If they do not re-validate their SP MEIR, they could find themselves in the position of being allowed to fly IFR in a jet but not a piston.

Instrument rating refers to the qualifications that a pilot must have in order to fly under instrument flight rules (IFR). It requires specific training and instruction beyond what is required for a private pilot certificate or commercial pilot certificate, including rules and procedures specific to instrument flying, additional instruction in meteorology, and more intensive training in flight solely by reference to instruments.

Die Instrumentenflugberechtigung (en. "Instrument Rating", Abk.: IR) berechtigt zum Führen von Luftfahrzeugen nach Instrumentenflugregeln (en. "Instrument Flight Rules", Abk.: IFR genannt). Sie kann als eine Zusatzberechtigung nach einer entsprechenden Ausbildung und Prüfung erworben werden. Für Verkehrsflugzeugführer (Inhaber einer Verkehrspilotenlizenz) für Flächenflugzeuge ist die Instrumentenflugberechtigung integraler Bestandteil der Pilotenlizenz.