History.

Early history.

19th century.

In 1802, Spain returned most of the land to France, but keeping title to about 7,500 square miles. In 1803, most of the land for modern day Kansas was acquired by the United States from France as part of the 828,000 square mile Louisiana Purchase for 2.83 cents per acre.  In 1854, the Kansas Territory was organized, then in 1861 Kansas became the 34th U.S. state. In 1873, Rawlins County was established.

Geography.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of, of which is land and (0.1%) is water.

Demographics.

As of the census of 2000, there were 2,966 people, 1,269 households, and 846 families residing in the county. The population density was 3 people per square mile (1/km2). There were 1,565 housing units at an average density of 2 per square mile (1/km2). The racial makeup of the county was 98.52% White, 0.30% Black or African American, 0.30% Native American, 0.10% Asian, 0.07% from other races, and 0.71% from two or more races. 0.81% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race.  There were 1,269 households out of which 27.50% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 59.50% were married couples living together, 4.90% had a female householder with no husband present, and 33.30% were non-families. 31.40% of all households were made up of individuals and 17.60% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.29 and the average family size was 2.88.  In the county, the population was spread out with 24.00% under the age of 18, 3.80% from 18 to 24, 21.50% from 25 to 44, 25.10% from 45 to 64, and 25.60% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 45 years. For every 100 females there were 99.90 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 95.10 males.  The median income for a household in the county was $32,105, and the median income for a family was $40,074. Males had a median income of $26,719 versus $19,750 for females. The per capita income for the county was $17,161. About 7.90% of families and 12.50% of the population were below the poverty line, including 18.00% of those under age 18 and 8.90% of those age 65 or over.

Government.

Presidential elections.

The county is part of the highly Republican Kansas's 1st congressional district. It has favored the Republican candidate for President in each of the last eighteen elections. The last Democrat to carry the county was Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936, when the GOP standard bearer was Kansas Governor Alf Landon. In the last five Presidential elections the Democratic candidate has never received more than 21% of the county's vote.

Law.

Following amendment to the Kansas Constitution in 1986, the county remained a prohibition, or "dry", county until 2002, when voters approved the sale of alcoholic liquor by the individual drink with a 30% food sales requirement.

Communities.

Townships.

Rawlins County is divided into ten townships. None of the cities within the county are considered "governmentally independent", and all figures for the townships include those of the cities. In the following table, the population center is the largest city (or cities) included in that township's population total, if it is of a significant size.

Rawlins County (standard abbreviation: RA) is a county located in the U.S. state of Kansas. As of the 2010 census, the county population was 2,519. The largest city and county seat is Atwood. It was named after Union Civil War General John Aaron Rawlins.

罗林斯县(英语:Rawlins County,简称RA)是美国堪萨斯州西北部的一个县,北邻内布拉斯加州。面积2,771平方公里。根据美国2000年人口普查,共有人口2,672人。县治阿特伍德(Atwood)。


Biography.

Early life and career.

Sandri was born in Buenos Aires to Antonio Enrico Sandri and Nella Righi, who had emigrated to Argentina from Ala, a village in Trentino in Italy. He studied humanities, philosophy and theology at the Metropolitan Seminary of Buenos Aires, and earned a Licentiate in Theology from the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina. On 2 December 1967 he was ordained to the priesthood by Archbishop Juan Carlos Aramburu and became his secretary.  He also served as curate of Nuestra Señora del Carmen in Villa Urquiza until 1970. He then studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University, where he obtained a doctorate in canon law, and the Pontifical Latin American College. In 1971, he entered the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy, which trains papal diplomats.

Diplomat and curial official.

In 1974, Sandri became an official of the Apostolic Nunciature in Madagascar and Mauritius, which also serves as the Apostolic Delegation in the islands of Comoros and Réunion in the Indian Ocean. He then served in the Vatican Secretariat of State, as secretary of the Substitute for General Affairs, including future cardinals Eduardo Martinez Somalo and Edward Cassidy from 1977 to 1989; and in the Apostolic Nunciature in the United States as permanent observer of the Holy See before the Organization of American States, from 1989 to 1991.  He became regent of the Prefecture of the Pontifical Household on 22 August 1991 and assessor of the Section for General Affairs in the Secretariat of State on 2 April 1992.  On 22 July 1997, Sandri was appointed Apostolic Nuncio to Venezuela and Titular Archbishop of Aemona by Pope John Paul II. He received his episcopal consecration on the following 11 October from Cardinal Angelo Sodano, with Cardinal Aramburu and Archbishop Giovanni Battista Re serving as co-consecrators, at St. Peter's Basilica. He selected as his episcopal motto: ""Ille Fidelis"", meaning, "He (Christ) remains faithful" (). He was the first Argentinian to hold the title of Apostolic Nuncio. After two years in Venezuela, he was named Apostolic Nuncio to Mexico on 1 March 2000. During his brief tenure there he was tasked with restraining the Mexican bishops from intervening in political affairs. On 16 September 2000, he was named Substitute for General Affairs, a key position within the Roman Curia, serving essentially as the chief of staff of the Secretariat of State.  While in that sensitive position, on 11 October 2006, Sandri sent a letter to Father Boniface Ramsey, a New York City pastor who was a seminary professor from 1986 to 1996. Sandri mentioned "the serious matters involving some of the students of the Immaculate Conception Seminary, which in November 2000 you were good enough to bring confidentially to the attention of the then Apostolic Nuncio in the United States, the late Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo." Though Sandri never mentioned it, Ramsey's 2000 letter was about complaints of sexual abuse of seminarians on the part of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick when he was Archbishop of Newark (1986–2000). Ramsey made Sandri's letter public on 7 September 2018 to document that his letter to the Nuncio Montalvo had reached Rome and that the highest levels of the Vatican have long been aware of the charges against McCarrick. By then McCarrick had resigned from the College of Cardinals, but he still faced a Church trial. On 5 February 2020, journalist Thomas J. Reese cited the Sandri-Ramsey correspondence in calling for a full review of the Secretariat's files as part of the Vatican investigation into McCarrick and who in the Vatican's highest levels know what about the charges against him.  As Pope John Paul's health declined, Sandri would read aloud the texts that the Pope could not deliver himself. On the evening of 2 April 2005 he announced the Pope's death from Saint Peter's Square, saying "We all feel like orphans this evening."

Congregation for the Oriental Churches.

On 9 June 2007, Sandri was appointed Prefect of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches by Pope Benedict XVI. Succeeding Ignatius I Daoud, he heads the curial congregation that handles matters regarding the Eastern Catholic Churches and is the "ex officio" Grand Chancellor of the Pontifical Oriental Institute. Pope Francis confirmed that appointment on 19 February 2014.  Sandri visited the Holy Land in February 2008. In April 2009, he lamented the emigration of Christians from that region: "This lack of peace makes Christians emigrate and leave their land behind. So we're left with a purely geological, physical presence of Jesus, and not with the presence of those that grew with him and lived his faith, and that continue to follow him today like disciples of his very homeland."In 2014 he called for an end to the forced removal of Christians from Iraq and Syria, saying that more than 100,000 Christians had left their homes in Iraq and "now wander to the city of Erbil in impossible conditions".  One analysis of the delay in the canonization process for John Paul II pointed to, among other things, Sandri's apparent reluctance to testify in the effort.  In November 2014 the Vatican lifted its 1929 ban on the ordination of married men to the priesthood by Eastern Catholic churches outside their traditional territories, including in the United States, Canada and Australia. Sandri signed the decree on 14 June 2014.

Cardinal.

Benedict XVI created him Cardinal-Deacon of San Carlo ai Catinari in the consistory of 24 November 2007. He delivered the message of thanksgiving to the Pope on behalf of the new cardinals on that occasion.  In April 2008, Sandri said that although the regime of Saddam Hussein was dictatorial, it is undeniable that Iraqi clergy and laity felt more secure under his regime and that their liturgical life went on undisturbed.  He was mentioned in the press as "papabile", a possible candidate for election to the papacy at the time of the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI in 2013.  Sandri is also a member of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, Pontifical Commission for Latin America and Pontifical Commission for Vatican City State. On 2 March 2010 he was appointed a member of the Congregation for Bishops. On 31 May 2011 he was appointed a member of the Apostolic Signatura. On 12 June 2012 Cardinal Sandri was appointed a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.  Sandri, as Prefect of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, was named by Pope Benedict XVI as one of four co-presidents of the Special Synod of Bishops for the Middle East held at the Vatican in October 2010.  He is eligible to participate in a papal conclave until he reaches the age of 80 on 18 November 2023. He speaks English, French, German, Italian and Spanish.  In June 2005 Archbishop Sandri was awarded Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic.  He opted for the order of Cardinal Priests on 19 May 2018. Pope Francis raised him to the rank of Cardinal Bishop effective 28 June 2018. On 24 January 2020, Pope Francis approved his election as Vice Dean of the College of Cardinals by the nine Latin-rite cardinal-bishops. With that title, as the highest-ranking cardinal eligible to participate in a conclave, he would preside over any conclave held before his 80th birthday.

Leonardo Sandri (born 18 November 1943) is an Argentine Cardinal of the Catholic Church. He has been the Prefect of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches since June 2007 and a cardinal since November of that year. He served in the diplomatic service of the Holy See from 1974 to 1991, in several overseas assignments including as permanent observer of the Holy See before the Organization of American States from 1989 to 1991, and in Rome as Substitute for General Affairs in the Secretariat of State from 1999 to 2007. On 24 January 2020, Pope Francis approved his election as Vice Dean of the College of Cardinals.

良纳·桑德里(;1943年-11月18日)是阿根廷籍枢机团副团长、罗马天主教主教级枢机及现任圣座东方教会部部长。


Etymology.

According to a modern etymology, the term "Azerbaijan" derives from that of "Atropates", a Persian satrap under the Achaemenid Empire, who was later reinstated as the satrap of Media under Alexander the Great. The original etymology of this name is thought to have its roots in the once-dominant Zoroastrianism. In the Avesta's "Frawardin Yasht" ("Hymn to the Guardian Angels"), there is a mention of "âterepâtahe ashaonô fravashîm ýazamaide", which literally translates from Avestan as "we worship the fravashi of the holy Atropatene." The name "Atropates" itself is the Greek transliteration of an Old Iranian, probably Median, compounded name with the meaning "Protected by

History.

Antiquity.

The earliest evidence of human settlement in the territory of Azerbaijan dates back to the late Stone Age and is related to the Guruchay culture of Azokh Cave. The Upper Paleolithic and late Bronze Age cultures are attested in the caves of Tağılar, Damcılı, Zar, Yataq-yeri and in the necropolises of Leylatepe and Saraytepe.  Early settlements included the Scythians in the 9th century

From the Sasanid period to the Safavid period.

The Sasanian Empire turned Caucasian Albania into a vassal state in 252, while King Urnayr officially adopted Christianity as the state religion in the 4th century. Despite Sassanid rule, Albania remained an entity in the region until the 9th century, while fully subordinate to Sassanid Iran, and retained its monarchy. Despite being one of the chief vassals of the Sasanian emperor, the Albanian king had only a semblance of authority, and the Sasanian marzban (military governor) held most civil, religious, and military authority.  In the first half of the 7th

Contemporary history.

After the Safavids, the area was ruled by the Iranian Afsharid dynasty. After the death of Nader Shah (r. 1736–1747), many of his former subjects capitalized on the eruption of instability. Numerous self-ruling khanates with various forms of autonomy emerged in the area. The rulers of these khanates were directly related to the ruling dynasties of Iran, and were vassals and subjects of the Iranian shah. The khanates exercised control over their affairs via international trade routes between Central Asia and the West.  Thereafter, the area was under the successive rule of the Iranian Zands and Qajars. From the late 18th century, Imperial Russia switched to a more aggressive geo-political stance towards its two neighbors and rivals to the south, namely Iran and the Ottoman Empire. Russia now actively tried to gain possession of the Caucasus region which was, for the most part, in the hands of Iran.

Independence.

Following the politics of "glasnost", initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev, civil unrest and ethnic strife grew in various regions of the Soviet Union, including Nagorno-Karabakh, an autonomous region of the Azerbaijan SSR. The disturbances in Azerbaijan, in response to Moscow's indifference to an already heated conflict, resulted in calls for independence and secession, which culminated in the Black January events in Baku. Later in 1990, the Supreme Council of the Azerbaijan SSR dropped the words "Soviet Socialist" from the title, adopted the "Declaration of Sovereignty of the Azerbaijan Republic" and restored the flag of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic as the state flag. As a consequence of the failed coup which occurred in August in Moscow, on 18 October 1991, the Supreme Council of Azerbaijan adopted a Declaration of Independence which was affirmed by a nationwide referendum in December 1991, while the Soviet Union officially ceased to exist on 26 December 1991. The country now celebrates its Independence Day on 18 October.  The early years of independence were overshadowed by the Nagorno-Karabakh war with the ethnic Armenian majority of Nagorno-Karabakh backed by Armenia. By the end of the hostilities in 1994, Armenians controlled up to 20 percent

Geography.

Geographically, Azerbaijan is located in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia, straddling Western Asia and Eastern Europe. It lies between latitudes 38° and 42° N, and longitudes 44° and 51° E. The total length of Azerbaijan's land borders is, of which 1,007 kilometers are with Armenia, 756 kilometers with Iran, 480 kilometers with Georgia, 390 kilometers with Russia and 15 kilometers with Turkey. The coastline stretches for, and the length of the widest area of the Azerbaijani section of the Caspian Sea is. The territory of Azerbaijan extends from north to south, and from west to east.  Three physical features dominate Azerbaijan: the Caspian Sea, whose shoreline forms a natural boundary to the east; the Greater Caucasus mountain range to the north; and the extensive flatlands at the country's center. There are also three mountain ranges, the Greater and Lesser Caucasus, and the Talysh Mountains, together covering approximately 40% of the country. The highest peak of Azerbaijan is Mount Bazardüzü (4,466 m), while the lowest point lies in the Caspian Sea (−28 m). Nearly half of all the mud volcanoes on Earth are concentrated in Azerbaijan, these volcanoes were also among nominees for the New7Wonders of Nature.  The main water sources are surface waters. However, only 24 of the 8,350 rivers are greater than in length. All the rivers drain into the Caspian Sea in the east of the country. The largest lake is Sarysu (67 km2), and the longest river is Kur (1,515 km), which is transboundary with Armenia. Azerbaijan's four main islands in the Caspian Sea have a combined area of over thirty square kilometers.  Since the independence of Azerbaijan in 1991, the Azerbaijani government has taken measures to preserve the environment of Azerbaijan. National protection of the environment accelerated after 2001 when the state budget increased due to new revenues provided by the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline. Within four years protected areas doubled and now makeup eight percent of the country's territory. Since 2001 the government has set up seven large reserves and almost doubled the sector of the budget earmarked for environmental protection.

Landscape.

Azerbaijan is home to a vast variety of landscapes. Over half of Azerbaijan's landmass consists of mountain ridges, crests, yailas, and plateaus which rise up to hypsometric levels of 400–1000 meters (including the Middle and Lower lowlands), in some places (Talis, Jeyranchol-Ajinohur and Langabiz-Alat foreranges) up to 100–120 meters, and others from 0–50 meters and up (Qobustan, Absheron). The rest of Azerbaijan's terrain consists of plains and lowlands. Hypsometric marks within the Caucasus region vary from about −28 meters at the Caspian Sea shoreline up to 4,466 meters (Bazardüzü peak).  The formation of climate in Azerbaijan is influenced particularly by cold arctic air masses of Scandinavian anticyclone, temperate air masses of Siberian anticyclone, and Central Asian anticyclone. Azerbaijan's diverse landscape affects the ways air masses enter the country. The Greater Caucasus protects the country from direct influences of cold air masses coming from the north. That leads to the formation of subtropical climate on most foothills and plains of the country. Meanwhile, plains and foothills are characterized by high solar radiation rates.  9 out of 11

Biodiversity.

The first reports on the richness and diversity of animal life in Azerbaijan can be found in travel notes of Eastern travelers. Animal carvings on architectural monuments, ancient rocks, and stones survived up to the present times. The first information on the flora and fauna of Azerbaijan was collected during the visits of naturalists to Azerbaijan in the 17th century.  There are 106 species of mammals, 97 species of fish, 363 species of birds, 10 species of amphibians and 52

Politics.

The structural formation of Azerbaijan's political system was completed by the adoption of the new Constitution on 12 November 1995. According to Article 23 of the Constitution, the state symbols of the Azerbaijan Republic are the flag, the coat of arms, and the national anthem. The state power in Azerbaijan is limited only by law for internal issues, but for international affairs is additionally limited by the provisions of international agreements.  The Constitution of Azerbaijan states that it is a presidential republic with three branches of power – Executive, Legislative, and Judicial. The legislative power is held by the unicameral National Assembly and the Supreme National Assembly in the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. The Parliament of Azerbaijan, called Milli Majlis, consists of 125 deputies elected based on majority vote, with a term of 5 years for each elected member. The elections are held every five years, on the first Sunday of November. The Parliament is not responsible for the formation of the government, but the Constitution requires the approval of the Cabinet of Ministers by Milli Majlis. The Yeni Azerbaijan Party, and independents loyal to the ruling government, currently hold almost all of the Parliament's 125 seats. During the 2010 Parliamentary election, the opposition parties, Musavat and Azerbaijani Popular Front Party, failed to win a single seat. European observers found numerous irregularities in the run-up to the election and on election day.  The executive power is held by the President, who is elected for a seven-year term by direct elections, and the Prime Minister. The president is authorized to form the Cabinet, a collective executive body, accountable to both the President and the National Assembly. The Cabinet of Azerbaijan consists primarily of the prime minister, his deputies, and ministers. The president does not have the right to dissolve the National Assembly but has the right to veto its decisions. To override the presidential veto, the parliament must have a majority of 95 votes. The judicial power is vested in the Constitutional Court, Supreme Court, and the Economic Court. The president nominates the judges in these courts. The European Commission for the Efficiency of Justice (CEPEJ) report refers to the Azerbaijani justice model on the selection of new judges as best practice, reflecting the particular features and the course of development towards ensuring the independence and quality of the judiciary in a new democracy.  Azerbaijan's system of governance nominally can be called two-tiered. The top or highest tier of the government is the Executive Power headed by President. The President appoints the Cabinet of Ministers and other high-ranking officials. The Local Executive Authority is merely a continuation of Executive Power. The legal status of local state administration in Azerbaijan is determined by the Provision on Local Executive Authority ("Yerli Icra Hakimiyati"), adopted 16 June 1999. In June 2012, the President approved the new Regulation, which granted additional powers to Local Executive Authorities, strengthening their dominant position in Azerbaijan's local affairs Chapter 9 of the Constitution of the Azerbaijan Republic addresses major issues of local self-government, such as the legal status of municipalities, types of local self-government bodies, their basic powers and relationships to other official entities. The other nominal tier of governance is municipalities ("Bələdiyə") and members of municipalities are elected by a general vote in Municipal elections every five years. Currently, there are 1,607 municipalities across the country. The Law on Municipal Elections and the Law on the Status of Municipalities were the first to be adopted in the field of local government (2 July 1999). The Law on Municipal Service regulates the activities of municipal employees, their rights, duties, labor conditions and social benefits, and outlines the structure of the executive apparatus and the organization of municipal service. The Law on the Status of Municipalities regulates the role and structure of municipal bodies and outlines state guarantees of legal and financial autonomy. The law pays special attention to the adoption and execution of municipal programs concerning social protection, social and economic development, and the local environment.  The Security Council is the deliberative body under the president, and he organizes it according to the Constitution. It was established on 10 April 1997. The administrative department is not a part of the president's office but manages the financial, technical and pecuniary activities of both the president and his office.  Although Azerbaijan has held several elections since regaining its independence and it has many of the formal institutions of democracy, it remains classified as "not free" (on border with "partly free") by Freedom House. In recent years, large numbers of Azerbaijani journalists, bloggers, lawyers, and human rights activists have been rounded up and jailed for their criticism of President Aliyev and government authorities. A resolution adopted by the European Parliament in September 2015 described Azerbaijan as "having suffered the greatest decline in democratic governance in all of Eurasia over the past ten years," noting as well that its dialogue with the country on human rights has "not made any substantial progress." On 17 March 2016, the President of Azerbaijan signed a decree pardoning more than a dozen of the persons regarded as political prisoners by some NGOs. This decree was welcomed as a positive step by the US State Department. On 16 March 2017 another pardon decree was signed, which led to the release of additional persons regarded as political prisoners.  Azerbaijan has been harshly criticized for bribing foreign officials and diplomats in order to promote its causes abroad and legitimize its elections at home, a practice which has been termed as Caviar diplomacy. However, on 6 March 2017, ESISC (European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center) published a report called "The Armenian Connection", in which it attacked human rights NGOs and research organisations criticising human rights violations and corruption in Azerbaijan. ESISC in that report asserted that the "Caviar Diplomacy" report elaborated by ESI aimed to create a climate of suspicion based on slander to form a network of MPs that would engage in a political war against Azerbaijan and that the network, composed of European PMs, Armenian officials, and some NGOs (Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, "Human Rights House Foundation", "Open Dialog, European Stability Initiative, and Helsinki Committee for Human Rights) was financed by the Soros Foundation. According to Robert Coalson (Radio Free Europe), ESISC is a part of Baku's lobbying efforts to extend the use of front think tanks to shift public opinion. Freedom Files Analytical Centre said that "The report is written in the worst traditions of authoritarian propaganda".

Military.

The history of the modern Azerbaijan army dates back to Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in 1918, when the National Army of the newly formed Azerbaijan Democratic Republic was created on 26 June 1918. When Azerbaijan gained independence after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Armed Forces of the Republic of Azerbaijan were created according to the Law on the Armed Forces of 9 October 1991. The original date of the establishment of the short-lived National Army is celebrated as Army Day (26 June) in today's Azerbaijan. As of 2002, Azerbaijan had 95,000 active personnel in its armed forces. There are also 17,000 paramilitary troops. The armed forces have three branches: the Land Forces, the Air Forces and the Navy. Additionally the armed forces embrace several military sub-groups that can be involved in state

Economy.

After gaining independence in 1991, Azerbaijan became a member of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Islamic Development Bank, and the Asian Development Bank. The banking system of Azerbaijan consists of the Central Bank of Azerbaijan, commercial banks and non-banking credit organizations. The National (now Central) Bank was created in 1992 based on the Azerbaijan State Savings Bank, an affiliate of the former State Savings Bank of the USSR. The Central Bank serves as Azerbaijan's central bank, empowered to issue the national currency, the Azerbaijani manat, and to supervise all commercial banks. Two major commercial banks are UniBank and the state-owned International Bank of Azerbaijan, run by Dr. Jahangir Hajiyev.  Pushed up by spending and demand growth, the 2007 Q1 inflation rate reached 16.6%. Nominal incomes and monthly wages climbed 29% and 25% respectively against this figure, but price increases in the non-oil industry encouraged inflation. Azerbaijan shows some signs of the so-called "Dutch disease" because of its fast-growing energy sector, which causes inflation and makes non-energy exports more expensive.  In the early 2000s the chronically high inflation was brought under control. This led to the launch of a new currency, the new Azerbaijani manat, on 1 January 2006, to cement the economic reforms and erase the vestiges of an unstable economy.  In 2008, Azerbaijan was cited as one of the top 10 reformers by the World Bank's Doing Business Report.  Azerbaijan is also ranked 57th in the Global Competitiveness Report for 2010–2011, above other CIS countries. By 2012 the GDP of Azerbaijan had increased 20-fold from its 1995 level.  According to World Bank's Doing Business report 2019, Azerbaijan improved its position in the Ease of doing business rank from 57 to 25. As a result of implementing a record number of reforms mainly involving institutional changes among the 10 top improvers, to do business in Azerbaijan became easier, such as time and cost to get construction permit reduced significantly (time by 80 days and cost by 12.563 AZN), process of connecting electricity grid rationalized, as well as getting credit simplified.

Energy and Natural Resources.

Two-thirds of Azerbaijan is rich in oil and natural gas.  The history of the oil industry of Azerbaijan dates back to the ancient period. Arabian historian and traveler Ahmed Al-Belaruri discussed the economy of the Absheron peninsula in antiquity, mentioning its oil in particular. There are lots of pipelines in Azerbaijan.  The region of the Lesser Caucasus accounts for most of the country's gold, silver, iron, copper, titanium, chromium, manganese, cobalt, molybdenum, complex ore and antimony. In September 1994, a 30-year contract was signed between the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) and 13 oil companies, among them Amoco, BP, ExxonMobil, Lukoil and Equinor. As Western oil companies are able to tap deepwater oilfields untouched by the Soviet exploitation, Azerbaijan is considered one of the most important spots in the world for oil exploration and

Agriculture.

Azerbaijan has the largest agricultural basin in the region. About 54.9 percent of Azerbaijan is agricultural land. At the beginning of 2007 there were 4,755,100 hectares of utilized agricultural area. In the same year the total wood resources counted 136 million m3. Azerbaijan's agricultural scientific research institutes are focused on meadows and pastures, horticulture and subtropical crops, green vegetables, viticulture

Tourism.

Tourism is an important part of the economy of Azerbaijan. The country was a well-known tourist spot in the 1980s. However, the fall of the Soviet Union, and the Nagorno-Karabakh War during the 1990s, damaged the tourist industry and the image of Azerbaijan as a tourist destination.  It was not until the 2000s that the tourism industry began to recover, and the country has since experienced a high rate of growth in the number of tourist visits and overnight stays. In the recent years, Azerbaijan has also become a popular destination for religious, spa, and health care tourism. During winter, the Shahdag Mountain Resort

Transportation.

The convenient location of Azerbaijan on the crossroad of major international traffic arteries, such as the Silk Road and the south–north corridor, highlights the strategic importance of transportation sector for the country's economy. The transport sector in the country includes roads, railways, aviation, and maritime transport.  Azerbaijan is also an important economic hub in the transportation of raw materials. The Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline (BTC) became operational in May 2006 and extends more than 1,774 kilometers through the territories of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey. The BTC is designed to transport up to 50 million tons of crude oil annually and carries oil from the Caspian Sea oilfields to global markets. The South Caucasus Pipeline, also stretching through

Science and technology.

In the 21st century, a new oil and gas boom helped to improve the situation in Azerbaijan's science and technology sectors, and the government launched a campaign aimed at modernization and innovation. The government estimates that profits from the information technology and communication industry will grow and become comparable to those from oil production.  Azerbaijan has a large and steadily growing Internet sector, mostly uninfluenced by the financial crisis of 2007–2008; rapid growth is forecast for at least five more years.  The country has also been making progress in developing its telecoms sector. The Ministry of Communications & Information Technologies (MCIT), as well as being an operator through its role in Aztelekom, is both a policy-maker and regulator. Public payphones are available for

Demographics.

, 52.8% of Azerbaijan's total population of 9,981,457 is urban, with the remaining 47.2% being rural. 50.1% of the total population is female. The sex ratio in the same year was 0.99 males per female.  The 2011 population growth-rate was 0.85%, compared to 1.09% worldwide. A significant factor restricting population growth is a high level of migration. In 2011 Azerbaijan saw a migration of −1.14/1,000 people.  The Azerbaijani diaspora is found in 42 countries and in turn there are many centers for ethnic minorities inside Azerbaijan, including the German cultural society "Karelhaus", Slavic cultural center, Azerbaijani-Israeli community, Kurdish cultural center, International Talysh Association, Lezgin national center "Samur", Azerbaijani-Tatar community, Crimean Tatars society, etc.

Ethnic groups.

The ethnic composition of the population according to the 2009 population census: 91.60% Azerbaijanis, 2.02% Lezgians, 1.35% Armenians (almost all Armenians

Urbanisation.

In total, Azerbaijan has 78 cities, 63 city districts, and

Languages.

The official language is Azerbaijani, which is a Turkic language. Azerbaijani is spoken by approximately 92% of the population as a mother tongue. Russian and Armenian (only in Nagorno-Karabakh) are also spoken, and each are the mother tongue of around 1.5% of the population respectively. Russian

Religion.

Around 97% of the population are Muslims. 85% of the Muslims are Shia and 15% Sunni; the Republic of Azerbaijan has the second highest proportion of Shia Muslims of any country in the world. Other faiths are practised by the country's various ethnic groups. Under article 48 of its Constitution, Azerbaijan is a secular state and ensures religious freedom. In a 2006–2008 Gallup poll, only 21% of respondents from Azerbaijan stated that religion is an important part of their daily lives. This makes Azerbaijan the least religious Muslim-majority country in the

Education.

A relatively high percentage of Azerbaijanis have obtained some form of higher education, most notably in scientific and technical subjects. In the Soviet era, literacy and average education levels rose dramatically from their very low starting point, despite two changes in the standard alphabet, from Perso-Arabic script to Latin in the 1920s and from Roman to Cyrillic in the 1930s. According to Soviet data, 100 percent of males and females (ages nine to forty-nine) were literate in 1970. According

Culture.

The culture of Azerbaijan has developed as a result of many influences. Today, national traditions are well preserved in the country despite Western influences, including globalized consumer culture. Some of the main elements of the Azerbaijani culture are: music, literature, folk dances and art, cuisine, architecture, cinematography and Novruz Bayram. The latter is derived from the traditional celebration of the New Year in the ancient Iranian religion of Zoroastrianism. Novruz is a family holiday.  The profile of Azerbaijan's population consists, as stated above, of Azerbaijanis, as well as other nationalities or ethnic groups, compactly living in various areas of the country. Azerbaijani national and traditional dresses are the Chokha and Papakhi. There are radio broadcasts in Russian, Georgian, Kurdish, Lezgian and Talysh languages, which are financed from the state budget. Some local radio stations in Balakan and Khachmaz organize broadcasts in Avar and Tat. In Baku several newspapers are published in Russian, Kurdish ("Dengi Kurd"), Lezgian ("Samur") and Talysh languages. Jewish society "Sokhnut" publishes the newspaper "Aziz".

Music and folk dances.

Music of Azerbaijan builds on folk traditions that reach back nearly a thousand years. For centuries Azerbaijani music has evolved under the badge of monody, producing rhythmically diverse melodies. Azerbaijani music has a branchy mode system, where chromatization of major and minor scales is of great importance. Among national musical instruments there are 14 string instruments, eight percussion instruments and six wind instruments. According to "The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians", "in terms of ethnicity, culture and religion the Azerbaijani are musically much closer to Iran than Turkey."  Mugham, meykhana and ashiq art are among the many musical traditions of Azerbaijan. Mugham is usually a suite with poetry and instrumental interludes. When performing mugham, the singers have to transform their emotions into singing and music. In contrast to the mugham traditions of Central Asian countries, Azerbaijani mugham is more free-form and less rigid; it is often compared to the improvised field of jazz. UNESCO proclaimed the Azerbaijani mugham tradition a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity on 7 November 2003. Meykhana is a kind of traditional Azerbaijani distinctive folk unaccompanied song,

Literature.

Among the medieval authors born within the territorial limits of modern Azerbaijani Republic was Persian poet and philosopher Nizami, called Ganjavi after his place of birth, Ganja, who was the author of the Khamseh ("The Quintuplet"), composed of five romantic poems, including "The Treasure of Mysteries," "Khosrow and Shīrīn," and "Leyli and Mejnūn."  The earliest known figure in Azerbaijani literature was Izzeddin Hasanoglu, who composed a divan consisting of Persian and Turkic ghazals. In Persian ghazals he used his pen-name, while his Turkic ghazals

Folk art.

Azerbaijanis have a rich and distinctive culture, a major part of which is decorative and applied art. This form of art is represented by a wide range of handicrafts, such as chasing, jeweler, engraving in metal, carving in wood, stone, and bone, carpet-making, lasing, pattern weaving and printing, knitting and embroidery. Each of these types of decorative art, evidence of the endowments of the Azerbaijan nation, is very much in favor here. Many interesting facts pertaining to the development of arts and crafts in Azerbaijan were reported by numerous merchants, travelers, and diplomats who had visited these places at different times.  The Azerbaijani carpet is a traditional handmade

Cuisine.

The traditional cuisine is famous for an abundance of vegetables and greens used seasonally in the dishes. Fresh herbs, including mint, cilantro (coriander), dill, basil, parsley, tarragon, leeks, chives, thyme, marjoram, green onion, and watercress, are very popular and often accompany main dishes on the table. Climatic diversity and fertility of the land are reflected in the national dishes, which are based

Architecture.

Azerbaijani architecture typically combines elements of East and West. Azerbaijiani architecture has heavy influences from Persian architecture. Many ancient architectural treasures such as the Maiden Tower and Palace of the Shirvanshahs in the Walled City of Baku survive in modern Azerbaijan. Entries submitted on the UNESCO World Heritage tentative list include the Ateshgah of Baku, Momine Khatun Mausoleum, Hirkan National Park, Binegadi National Park, Lökbatan Mud Volcano, Baku Stage Mountain, Caspian Shore Defensive Constructions, Shusha National Reserve, Ordubad National Reserve and the

Visual art.

Azerbaijani art includes one of the oldest art objects in the world, which were discovered as Gamigaya Petroglyphs in the territory of Ordubad Rayon are dated back to the 1st to 4th centuries BC. About 1500 dislodged and carved rock paintings with images of deer, goats, bulls, dogs, snakes, birds, fantastic beings and also people, carriages and various symbols had been found out on basalt rocks. Norwegian ethnographer and adventurer Thor Heyerdahl was convinced that people from the area went to Scandinavia

Cinema.

The film industry in Azerbaijan dates back to 1898. In fact, Azerbaijan was among the first countries involved in cinematography. Therefore, it is not surprising that this apparatus soon showed up in Baku – at the start of the 20th century, this bay town on the Caspian was producing more than 50 percent of the world's supply of oil. Just like today, the oil industry attracted foreigners eager to invest and to work. In 1919, during the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, a documentary "The Celebration of the Anniversary of Azerbaijani Independence" was filmed on the

Media and media freedom.

There are three state-owned television channels: AzTV, Idman TV and Medeniyyet TV. One public

Human rights in Azerbaijan.

The Constitution of Azerbaijan claims to guarantee freedom of speech, but this is denied in practice. After several years of decline in press and media freedom, in 2014, the media environment in Azerbaijan deteriorated rapidly under a governmental campaign to silence any opposition and criticism, even while the country led the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (May–November 2014). Spurious legal charges and impunity in violence against journalists have remained the norm. All foreign broadcasts are banned in the

Sport.

Freestyle wrestling has been traditionally regarded as Azerbaijan's national sport, in which Azerbaijan won up to fourteen medals, including four golds since joining the International Olympic Committee. Currently, the most popular sports include football and wrestling.  Football is the most popular sport in Azerbaijan, and the Association of Football Federations of Azerbaijan with 9,122 registered players, is the largest sporting association in the country. The national football team of Azerbaijan demonstrates relatively low performance in the international arena compared to the nation football clubs. The most successful Azerbaijani football clubs are Neftchi Baku, Qarabağ, and Gabala. In 2012, Neftchi Baku became the first

External links.

General information  Major government resources  Major news media  Tourism

Azerbaijan (, ; ), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan ( ), is a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia at the crossroads of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west and Iran to the south. The exclave of Nakhchivan is bounded by Armenia to the north and east, Iran to the south and west, and has an long border with Turkey in the northwest.

阿塞拜疆共和国(),通称阿塞拜疆(,发音:),是一个位于西亚外高加索东部的跨大陆的总统制、宪法共和制的国家,所处地区是连接东欧和西亚的十字路口,东临里海,南接伊朗,西边和亚美尼亚、土耳其及格鲁吉亚为邻,北界俄罗斯。阿塞拜疆的一块飞地:纳希切万自治共和国,与土耳其东北部有小段接壤。国名来自于古波斯语,意为“火的国家”。该国以地理位置而言属于亚洲,但对外一般自称欧洲国家。


菲利普斯县 (科罗拉多州)

Geography.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of, of which is land and (0.02%) is water.

Demographics.

At the 2000 census there were 4,480 people, 1,781 households, and 1,239 families living in the county. The population density was 6 people per square mile (3/km2). There were 2,014 housing units at an average density of 3 per square mile (1/km2). The racial makeup of the county was 93.04% White, 0.20% Black or African American, 0.29% Native American, 0.40% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 4.71% from other races, and 1.34% from two or more races. 11.76% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. Of the 1,781 households 32.90% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 61.20% were married couples living together, 5.60% had a female householder with no husband present, and 30.40% were non-families. Of all households 27.50% were one person and 14.30% were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.47 and the average family size was 3.01.  The age distribution was 26.90% under the age of 18, 6.30% from 18 to 24, 25.30% from 25 to 44, 22.20% from 45 to 64, and 19.40% 65 or older. The median age was 40 years. For every 100 females there were 93.40 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 90.50 males.  The median household income was $32,177 and the median family income was $38,144. Males had a median income of $30,095 versus $18,682 for females. The per capita income for the county was $16,394. About 8.80% of families and 11.60% of the population were below the poverty line, including 14.70% of those under age 18 and 7.20% of those age 65 or over.

Politics.

Like all the High Plains, Phillips County is overwhelmingly Republican. It has not been carried by a Democratic Presidential nominee since Jimmy Carter in 1976, and Michael Dukakis in 1988 during a major drought has been the only Democrat since to receive over one-third of the county's ballots.

Phillips County is one of the 64 counties in the U.S. state of Colorado. As of the 2010 census, the population was 4,442. The county seat is Holyoke. The county was named in honor of R.O. Phillips, a secretary of the Lincoln Land Company, who organized several towns in Colorado.

菲利普斯县(英语:Phillips County)是美国科罗拉多州东北部的一个县,东邻内布拉斯加州。面积1,781平方公里。根据美国2000年人口普查,共有人口4,480人。县治霍利奥克 (Holyoke)。


Early life.

Born in the United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands, Japan to American parents, Hailey grew up in Bellevue, Nebraska.  At 17, she came out as a lesbian before moving to New York City to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

Career.

Music.

With her Academy classmate Heather Grody, she formed the pop duo The Murmurs in 1991. In the 1990s, they released several albums and toured on the Lilith Fair. In 2001, Hailey and Grody changed their name to Gush. The group disbanded when Hailey was cast in "The L Word". In 2005, Hailey founded Marfa Records.  In July 2007, Uh Huh Her, an electropop duo consisting of Hailey and Camila Grey, released an EP entitled "I See Red"; over a year later they released their first album "Common Reaction".  Hailey also co-wrote the Shakira hit song "Don't Bother" for her 2005 hit album "Oral Fixation Vol. 2".

Acting.

Hailey's television debut was in 1996 when she played a struggling musician on an episode of "Boy Meets World". Her first major film role was in the 1997 movie "All Over Me".  From 2004 to 2009, she starred as Alice Pieszecki, a journalist, television, and radio show host, on "The L Word". At the beginning of the series, Hailey's character identified as bisexual. By the end of the series, specifically in season 5, her character dated mostly women.  In September 2008, Showtime announced Hailey would star in "The Farm", a "pilot presentation spinoff" of "The L Word", to be written and produced by Ilene Chaiken, creator and executive producer of "The L Word". It was announced in April 2009 that the show would not be picked up by Showtime.  Hailey's award-winning indie film "La Cucina" premiered on Showtime in December 2009, where she plays a straight pregnant newlywed.  Hailey has appeared in several Yoplait yogurt commercials as well as a BMW commercial. In April 2008, Hailey was named spokesperson for Olivia Cruises, a travel company which sells cruises and resort vacations marketed towards lesbian customers. She also stars in the psychological thriller Fertile Ground.  In 2015, Hailey appeared in an episode of long-running The CW show "Supernatural" as Amelia Novak, the estranged wife of Jimmy Novak (human vessel of the angel Castiel, played by Misha Collins.)  In 2007, Hailey was named the sexiest woman in the AfterEllen Hot 100 list compiled by AfterEllen.com.

Personal life.

Hailey dated k.d. lang for nearly 5 years until breaking up in 2001. She also had a long-term relationship with Nina Garduno from 2004 to 2010. From 2011 to 2016, she was dating her bandmate Camila Grey. Their relationship first became public when the two were ejected from a Southwest Airlines flight for arguing with a flight attendant who asked them to stop kissing.

Leisha Hailey (born July 11, 1971) is an American actress and musician known for playing Alice Pieszecki in the Showtime Networks series "The L Word" and "". Hailey first came to the public's attention as a musician in the pop duo The Murmurs and has continued her music career as part of the band Uh Huh Her.

蕾莎·海利(英语:Leisha Hailey,1971年-7月11日),美国演员、音乐家,以出演美国影集《拉字至上》中爱丽丝·皮亚柴斯基一角著称。目前是美国流行乐队Uh Huh Huh的成员。


Design.

Most volume-manager implementations share the same basic design. They start with physical volumes (PVs), which can be either hard disks, hard disk partitions, or Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs) of an external storage device. Volume management treats each PV as being composed of a sequence of chunks called physical extents (PEs). Some volume managers (such as that in HP-UX and Linux) have PEs of a uniform size; others (such as that in Veritas) have variably-sized PEs that can be split and merged at will.  Normally, PEs simply map one-to-one to logical extents (LEs). With mirroring, multiple PEs map to each LE. These PEs are drawn from a physical volume group (PVG), a set of same-sized PVs which act similarly to hard disks in a RAID1 array. PVGs are usually laid out so that they reside on different disks or data buses for maximum redundancy.  The system pools LEs into a "volume group" (VG). The pooled LEs can then be concatenated together into virtual disk partitions called logical volumes or LVs. Systems can use LVs as raw block devices just like disk partitions: creating mountable file systems on them, or using them as swap storage.  Striped LVs allocate each successive LE from a different PV; depending on the size of the LE, this can improve performance on large sequential reads by bringing to bear the combined read-throughput of multiple PVs.  Administrators can grow LVs (by concatenating more LEs) or shrink them (by returning LEs to the pool). The concatenated LEs do not have to be contiguous. This allows LVs to grow without having to move already-allocated LEs. Some volume managers allow the re-sizing of LVs in either direction while online. Changing the size of the LV does not necessarily change the size of a file system on it; it merely changes the size of its containing space. A file system that can be resized online is recommended in that it allows the system to adjust its storage on-the-fly without interrupting applications.  PVs and LVs cannot be shared between or span different VGs (although some volume managers may allow moving them at will between VGs on the same host). This allows administrators conveniently to bring VGs online, to take them offline or to move them between host systems as a single administrative unit.  VGs can grow their storage pool by absorbing new PVs or shrink by retracting from PVs. This may involve moving already-allocated LEs out of the PV. Most volume managers can perform this movement online; if the underlying hardware is hot-pluggable this allows engineers to upgrade or replace storage without system downtime.

Concepts.

Hybrid volume.

A hybrid volume is any volume that intentionally and opaquely makes use of two separate physical volumes. For instance, a workload may consist of random seeks so an SSD may be used to permanently store frequently used or recently written data, while using higher-capacity rotational magnetic media for long-term storage of rarely needed data. On Linux, bcache or dm-cache may be used for this purpose, while Fusion Drive may be used on OS X. ZFS also implements this functionality at the file system level, by allowing administrators to configure multi-level read/write caching.  Hybrid volumes present a similar concept as hybrid drives, which also combine solid-state storage and rotational magnetic media.

Snapshots.

Some volume managers also implement snapshots by applying copy-on-write to each LE. In this scheme, the volume manager will copy the LE to a "copy-on-write table" just before it is written to. This preserves an old version of the LV, the snapshot, which may be later reconstructed by overlaying the copy-on-write table atop the current LV. Unless the volume management supports both thin provisioning and discard, once an LE in the origin volume is written to, it is permanently stored in the snapshot volume. If the snapshot volume was made smaller than its origin, which is a common practice, this may render the snapshot inoperable.  Snapshots can be useful for backing up self-consistent versions of volatile data such as table files from a busy database, or for rolling back large changes (such as an operating system upgrade) in a single operation. Snapshots have a similar effect as rendering storage quiescent, and are similar to the shadow copy (VSS) service in Microsoft Windows.  Some Linux-based Live CDs also use snapshots to simulate read-write access to a read-only optical disc.

Disadvantages.

Logical volumes can suffer from external fragmentation when the underlying storage devices do not allocate their PEs contiguously. This can reduce I/O performance on slow-seeking media such as magnetic disks and other rotational media. Volume managers that use fixed-size PEs, however, typically make PEs relatively large (for example, Linux LVM uses 4 MB by default) in order to amortize the cost of these seeks.  With implementations that are solely volume management, such as Core Storage and Linux LVM, separating and abstracting away volume management from the file system loses the ability to easily make storage decisions for particular files or directories. For example, if a certain directory (but not the entire file system) is to be permanently moved to faster storage, both the file system layout and the underlying volume management layer need to be traversed. For example, on Linux it would be needed to manually determine the offset of a file's contents within a file system and then manually the extents (along with data not related to that file) to the faster storage. Having volume and file management implemented within the same subsystem, instead of having them implemented as separate subsystems, makes the overall process theoretically simpler.

Bohdan Paczyński or Bohdan Paczynski (8 February 1940 – 19 April 2007) was a Polish astronomer notable in the theory of the stellar evolution, accretion discs, and gamma ray bursts.

玻丹·帕琴斯基(,英语:Bohdan Paczynski,或翻译为帕钦斯基,1940年-2月8日-2007年-4月19日),波兰天文学家,是恒星演化、吸积盘以及伽玛射线暴理论中居领导地位的科学家。


History.

Background.

Canadian origins.

Beginning in 1914, the Polish community in North America began to organize in hopes of setting up a military organization with an end-goal of an independent Poland. In late 1914 a delegation was sent by the Polish-American group PCKR (Polski Centralny Komitet Ratunkowy / Polish Central Relief Committee) to Canada in hopes of setting up a Polish unit made up of North Americans of Polish ancestry, but the Canadian government rebuffed them. As the war dragged on, they tried again and found a supporter in Quebec industrialist William Evan Price III. With his contacts, the Polish delegation met Sam Hughes, the Canadian Minister of Militia and Defence, and pitched a "Polish Legion of Canada" composed of three battalions. This time there was considerable interest, and the Canadians sought and were given permission by British high command to start setting up a Polish Army Camp in Niagara-on-the-Lake. With permission granted the Polish army-in-exile called its camp "Tadeusz Kościuszko Camp," honouring a Polish patriot who led the 1794 Kościuszko Uprising aimed at freeing the country from Imperial Russia and the Kingdom of Prussia. Over 20,000 men trained in Canada, equipped and paid by France. Yet even though the camp was in Canada and supported financially by the French, the Americans viewed it as a threat to their neutrality.

America enters the war.

The emergence of the Blue Army was closely associated with the American entry into World War I in April, 1917. A month earlier, Ignacy Jan Paderewski submitted a proposal to U.S. House of Representatives to accept Polish-American volunteers for service on the Western Front in the name of Poland's independence. Some 24,000 Poles were taken in (out of 38,000 who applied) and after a brief military training, they were sent to France to join General Haller, including many women volunteers (PSK). Polish-Americans were eager to fight for freedom and the American-style democracy because they themselves escaped persecution by the empires who partitioned Poland a century earlier. When the war erupted, the American Polonia created the Polish Central Relief Committee to help with the war effort, although ethnically Polish volunteers arrived in France from all Polish diasporas at the same time numbering over 90,000 soldiers eventually. The Entente responded in kind by recognizing the Polish National Committee formed in France (led by Dmowski) as Poland's interim government, with Wilson's written promise (issued on 8 January 1918) to recreate a sovereign Polish state after their victory. Poland's long-term occupier, Tsarist Russia, got out of the war, overrun by the Bolsheviks who signed a treaty in Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918, which was voided after Imperial Germany was overthrown in November 1918 and the successor revolutionary government surrendered in the 11 November 1918 armistice.  The Blue Army was formally merged into the Polish Army after the Armistice between the Allies and Germany. Meanwhile, three interim Polish governments emerged independently of one another. A socialist government led by Daszyński was formed in Lublin. The National Committee emerged in Kraków. Daszyński (lacking support) decided to join forces with Piłsudski who was just released by the Germans from Magdeburg. On 16 November 1918, Poland declared independence. A decree defining the new republic was issued in Warsaw on 22 November 1918. A month later, Paderewski joined in from France. At about the same time, heavily armed Ukrainians from the "Sitchovi Stril'ci" (Sich Riflemen) seized the city of Lemberg, and the battle for the control of the city erupted against Piłsudski's legionaries. It was a high-stakes gamble with all sides attempting to establish a new regime ahead of the European peace conference in Versailles of January 1919. Similar Polish uprisings erupted in Poznań on 27 December 1918, Upper Silesia in August 1919 then again in 1920 and May 1921 — separated by the ad-hoc (or outright illegitimate) plebiscites with trainloads of German agents acting as local inhabitants. In the spring of 1919, the Blue Army (no longer needed in the West) was transported to Poland by train. The German forces were very slow to withdraw. In all, some 2,100 soldiers of the Blue Army who enlisted in France from the Polish diasporas died in the fighting, including over 50 officers serving with Haller. Over 1,600 men were wounded. Haller's army included 25,000 ethnic Poles drafted against their will by the German and Austrian armies, out of 50,000 conscripts from across partitioned Poland. They joined Haller from the POW camps in Italy in 1919. The final borders of Poland were set only in October, 1921 by the League of Nations.

World War I.

Western Front.

The first divisions were formed after the official signing of a 1917 alliance by French President Raymond Poincaré and the Polish statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski. The majority of the recruits, approximately 35,000 of them, were either Poles serving in the French Army or former captured Polish prisoners of war, who were conscripted and forced to serve in the German Heer and Austrian Imperial-Royal Landwehr armies. Many other Poles also joined from all over the world—these units included recruits from the United States with an additional 23,000 Polish-American volunteers and former troops of the Russian Expeditionary Force in France. Members of the Polish diaspora community in Brazil joined the army, with more than 300 men volunteering as well.  The Blue Army was initially placed under direct French military control and commanded by General Louis Archinard. However, on 23 February 1918, political and military sovereignty was granted to the Polish National Committee, and soon after that, the army was directly commanded by independent Polish authorities. Also, more units were formed, most notably the 4th and 5th Rifle Divisions in Russia. On 28 September 1919, Russian government officials formally signed an agreement with the Entente that officially recognized the Polish military units in France as "the only independent, allied and co-belligerent Polish army." On 4 October 1918, the National Committee appointed General Józef Haller von Hallenburg as chief commander of the Polish Legions in France. The first unit to enter combat on the Western Front was the 1st Rifle Regiment ("1 Pułk Strzelców Polskich") fighting from July 1918 in Champagne and the Vosges mountains. By October, the entire 1st Rifle Division had joined the campaign around the area of Rambervillers and Raon-l'Étape.

Transfer to Poland.

The army continued to gather recruits after the end of World War I. Many of these new volunteers were ethnic Poles who were conscripted into the German, Austrian and Russian armies, and later discharged following the signing of the armistice agreement on 11 November 1918. By early 1919, the Blue Army numbered 68,500 men and was fully equipped by the French government. After being denied permission by German officials to enter Poland via the Baltic port city of Danzig ("Gdańsk"), transportation was arranged via rail.  Between April and June of that year, all the army units were moved to a newly independent Poland, across Germany in sealed train cars. Weapons were secured in separate compartments and kept under guard to appease German concerns about a foreign army traversing its territory. Immediately after its arrival, the divisions were integrated into the regular Polish Army and sent to the front lines to fight in the Polish–Ukrainian War, which was being contested in eastern Galicia. The perilous journey from France (through revolutionary Germany) to Poland in the spring of 1919 was documented by those who lived through it.  Captain Stanisław I. Nastal: "Preparations for the departure lasted for some time. The question of transit became a difficult and complicated problem. Finally after a long wait a decision was made and officially agreed upon between the Allies and Germany. The first transports with the Blue Army set out in the first half of April, 1919. Train after train tore along though Germany to the homeland, to Poland."  Major Stefan Wyczółkowski: "On 15 April 1919 the regiment began its trip to Poland from the Bayon railroad station in four transports, via Mainz, Erfurt, Leipzig, Kalisz, and Warsaw, and arrived in Poland, where it was quartered in individual battalions; in Chełm 1st Battalion, supernumerary company and command of the regiment; 3rd Battalion in Kowel; and the 2nd Battalion in Wlodzimierz".  Major Stanisław Bobrowski: "On 13 April 1919 the regiment set out across Germany for Poland, to reinforce other units of the Polish army being created in the homeland amid battle, shielding with their youthful breasts the resurrected Poland".  Major Jerzy Dąbrowski: "Finally on 18 April 1919 the regiment's first transport set out for Poland. On 23 April 1919 the leading divisions of the 3rd Regiment of Polish Riflemen set foot on Polish soil, now free thanks to their own efforts".  Lt. Wincenty Skarzyński: "Weeks passed. April 1919 arrived – then plans were changed: it was decided irrevocably to transport our army to Gdańsk instead by trains, through Germany. Many officers came from Poland, among them Major Gorecki, to coordinate technical details with General Haller."

Polish–Ukrainian War.

Haller's troops changed the balance of power in Galicia and Volhynia. Their arrival allowed the Poles to repel the Ukrainians and establish a demarcation line at the river Zbruch on 14 May 1919. The Blue Army was equipped by the Western Allies, and supported by experienced French officers specifically ordered to fight against the Bolsheviks, but not the forces of the Western Ukrainian People's Republic. Despite the diplomatic conditions, the Poles dispatched Haller's Army against the Ukrainians first, instead of the Bolsheviks. The tactical initiative was done in order to break the stalemate in eastern Galicia. In response, the allies sent several telegrams ordering the Polish government to halt its offensive, as using the allied-equipped army against the Western Ukrainian People's Republic specifically contradicted the status of the French military advisors, but the demands were ignored. The offensive by the Blue Army succeeded in breaking the stalemate and brought about a collapse of the West Ukrainian army. In July 1919, after securing victory on the Ukrainian front, the Blue Army was transferred to the border with Germany in Silesia, where it prepared defensive positions against a possible German invasion of Poland from the west.

Polish–Bolshevik War.

During the Polish-Bolshevik War several Blue Army formations were merged with the regular Polish army, and jointed together to form the 49th Hutsul Rifle Regiment and 18th Infantry Division. Haller's well trained and highly motivated troops, as well as their British built Bristol F.2 reconnaissance planes, Italian made Ansaldo A.1 Balilla fighter planes and French FT-17 tanks, also played a significant role in the war. The Polish-American first engaged the Bolshevik forces near the town of Rivne ("Równe" in Polish) on 18 June 1919. After pushing the Bolsheviks east, the Blue Army advance halted and the troops engaged in small skirmishes until the end of the war. Haller's troops would try to entrap small units of Bolshevik soldiers as well as raid garrisons for food, ammunition and to spread panic amongst the enemy.

Post-war.

The Blue Army's 15th Infantry Rifle Regiment formed a basis for the 49th Hutsul Rifle Regiment (part of the 11th Carpathian Infantry Division) after the end of World War I.  During the Communist crackdown in Poland after World War II, most of the history related to the Polish-Soviet War and the Blue Army was censored, distorted and repressed by the Soviet authorities.

Anti-Jewish violence.

Throughout the fighting on the Ukrainian front, soldiers from the Blue Army assaulted local Jews, believing that some of them were cooperating with Poland's enemies. In eastern Galicia this included fighting a Jewish battalion of the Ukrainian Galician Army under the leadership of Solomon Leinberg.  On 27 May 1919 a soldier by the name of Stanisław Dziadecki who served in one of the Blue Army's rifle divisions in Częstochowa, was shot and wounded while on patrol. A Jewish tailor was suspected of the shooting, and was promptly executed by Haller's soldiers and accompanying civilians, who proceeded to loot Jewish homes and businesses, killing 5-10 Jews and injuring several dozen more. Pavel Korzec wrote that as the army traveled further east, some of Haller's soldiers, as a way to exact retribution, continued to loot Jewish properties and engage in violence. Willian Hagen described Haller's troops together with civilian mobs as assaulting Jewish policemen, beating worshipers and destroying Jewish prayer books in synagogues in eastern Chełm. Polish police and regular army soldiers were occasionally able to restrain Haller's troops.  According to Howard Sachar, in the year and a half prior to the Blue Army's arrival, the total number of Jewish casualties in the region was between 400 and 500; Haller's troops' violence caused this number to double. The Morgenthau Report estimated that the total number of Jews killed as a result of actions made by the Polish military (including the Blue Army) did not exceed 200–300. As a result of the Blue Army's activities, General Haller's visit to the United States was met with protests from American Jewish and Ukrainian communities. Tadeusz Piotrowski wrote that in most cases it's impossible to disentangle gratuitous antisemitism from commonplace looting and soldier brutality. He claims that the term "pogrom" in the accepted sense of the deliberate killing of Jewish civilians could not be applied to the great majority of the incidents in which the Blue Army was involved.

Causes.

According to Alexander Prusin there were a number of causes for the anti-semitic acts of the Polish forces. Socioeconomic tensions regarding land reforms and conflation of Jews with the landed class led to the feelings of hostility. Also, the lack of appropriate government compensation to the Polish soldiers led to soldiers viewing the looting of Jews as partial re-compensation for their service. For soldiers from Western Poland who remembered how many Jews have previously collaborated with Germany during a recent Polish-German conflict in 1919, this allowed framing of anti-semitic attacks as retribution on enemies of the Polish nation. Further, for many Poles Jews were associated with Bolshevism, and the Endeks in particular promoted the stereotype of Jewish Bolshevism. Likewise, according to Joanna Michlic, some perpetrators of anti-Jewish violence legitimized their actions in the name of national self defense. Officers and soldiers in the Blue Army expressed these tendencies, and often treated all Jews as communists, despite the traditional religious character and political diversity of Jewish communities. Some of the more significant incidents of abuse were inflicted by the Polish-American volunteers. It is likely that the cultural shock of finding themselves confronted by a multitude of unfamiliar ethnic, political and religious groups that inhabited Western Ukraine led to a feeling of vulnerability, that in turn provoked the violent outbursts. Encyclopaedia Judaica writes that because of its French ties the Blue Army enjoyed independence from the main Polish command, and some of its soldiers exploited this when engaging in undisciplined action against Jewish communities in Galicia.

Personnel.

Veteran status of Polish-American volunteers.

After the war, the Polish-American volunteers who served within Haller's Army were not recognized as veterans by either the American or Polish governments. This led to friction between the Polish community in the United States and the Polish government, and resulted in the subsequent refusal by Polish-Americans to again help the Polish cause militarily.

Jewish volunteers.

Polish Jews enlisted and fought alongside ethnic Poles within the Blue Army, serving as soldiers, doctors and nurses. According to Edward Goldstein writing in "The Galitzianer", on examining a list of 1,381 casualty names compiled by Paul Valasek, he identified 62 (or approximately 5%) Jewish sounding names in the list.

Notable persons.

Ludwik Marian Kaźmierczak, the paternal grandfather of the German chancellor Angela Merkel, and an ethnic Pole born in Posen (Poznań), German Empire served in the Blue Army. During World War I, he was drafted into the German Army in 1915 and fought on the western front. After being taken as a prisoner of war in France, he joined the Blue Army, and subsequently fought in the Polish-Ukrainian and Polish-Soviet wars. After ending his service Kaźmierczak immigrated back to Germany.

Order of battle.

The order of battle shows the hierarchical organization of an armed force participating in a military operation or campaign. The Blue Army order of battle was as follows:

Bibliography.

Notes  References

The Blue Army (Polish: "Błękitna Armia"), or Haller's Army, was a Polish military contingent created in France during the latter stages of World War I. The name came from the French-issued blue military uniforms worn by the soldiers. The symbolic term used to describe the troops was subsequently adopted by General Józef Haller von Hallenburg himself to represent all newly organized Polish Legions fighting in western Europe.

蓝军是一支在一次大战晚期于法国成立的波兰军队分支,其名称源自法国派发给士兵所穿的蓝色军服。后来将军将此一象征名称,用于所有在东欧作战的新成立波兰军团。这支军队成立于1917年4月,由在法国与联军一同作战的波兰自愿兵组成。一次大战期间,西方战线的战事结束后,这支军队被转送往波兰加入其他战斗部队,共同为夺回波兰独立一事而战。波兰之所以能在后来的波乌战争中获胜,蓝军扮演了关键角色。


Name.

In Chinese, the word can be applied to "any" weapon with a single-edged blade and usually refers to knives. Because of this, the term is sometimes translated as knife or Nonetheless, within Chinese martial arts and in military contexts, the larger "sword" versions of the "dao" are usually intended.

General characteristics.

While dao have varied greatly over the centuries, most single-handed dao of the Ming period and later, and the modern swords that are based on them share a number of characteristics. Dao blades are moderately curved and single-edged, though often with a few inches of the back edge sharpened as well; the moderate curve allows them to be reasonably effective in the thrust. Hilts are sometimes canted, curving in the opposite direction of the blade which improves handling in some forms of cuts and thrusts. Cord is usually wrapped over the wood of the handle. Hilts may also be pierced like those of "jian" (straight-bladed Chinese sword) for the addition of lanyards, though modern swords for performances will often have tassels or scarves instead. Guards are typically disc-shaped and often cupped. This was to prevent rainwater from getting into the sheath, and to prevent blood from dripping down to the handle, which would make it more difficult to grip. Sometimes guards are thinner pieces of metal with an s-curve, the lower limb of the curve protecting the user's knuckles; very rarely they may have guards like those of the "jian".  Other variations to the basic pattern include the large "bagua dao" and the long handled "pudao".

Early history.

The earliest dao date from the Shang Dynasty in China's Bronze Age, and are known as "zhibeidao" (直背刀) – straight backed knives. As the name implies, these were straight-bladed or slightly curved weapons with a single edge. Originally bronze, these weapons were made of iron or steel by the time of the late Warring States period as metallurgical knowledge became sufficiently advanced to control the carbon content. Originally less common as a military weapon than the "jian" – the straight, double-edged blade of China – the dao became popular with cavalry during the Han dynasty due to its sturdiness, superiority as a chopping weapon, and relative ease of use – it was generally said that it takes a week to attain competence with a dao/saber, a month to attain competence with a "qiang"/spear, and a year to attain competence with a "jian"/straight sword. Soon after dao began to be issued to infantry, beginning the replacement of the "jian" as a standard-issue weapon. Late Han dynasty dao had round grips and ring-shaped pommels, and ranged between 85 and 114 centimeters in length. These weapons were used alongside rectangular shields.  By the end of the Three Kingdoms period, the single-edged "dao" had almost completely replaced the "jian" on the battlefield. The "jian" henceforth became known as a weapon of self-defense for the scholarly aristocratic class, worn as part of court dress.

Sui, Tang, and Song.

As in the preceding dynasties, Tang dynasty "dao" were straight along the entire length of the blade. Single-handed "peidao" ("belt "dao"") were the most common sidearm in the Tang dynasty. These were also known as "hengdao" ("horizontal "dao"" or "cross "dao"") in the preceding Sui dynasty. Two-handed "changdao" ("long "dao"") or "modao" were also used in the Tang, with some units specializing in their use.  During the Song Dynasty, one form of infantry dao was the "shoudao", a chopping weapon with a clip point. While some illustrations show them as straight, the 11th century Song military encyclopedia Wujing Zongyao depicts them with curved blades – possibly an influence from the steppe tribes of Central Asia, who would conquer parts of China during the Song period. Also dating from the Song are the falchion-like "dadao", the long, two-handed "zhanmadao", and the long-handled, similarly two-handed "buzhandao" (步战刀).

Yuan, Ming and Qing.

With the Mongol invasion of China in the early 13th century and the formation of the Yuan dynasty, the curved steppe saber became a greater influence on Chinese sword designs. Sabers had been used by Turkic, Tungusic, and other steppe peoples of Central Asia since at least the 8th century CE, and it was a favored weapon among the Mongol aristocracy. Its effectiveness for mounted warfare and popularity among soldiers across the entirety of the Mongol empire had lasting effects.  In China, Mongol influence lasted long after the collapse of the Yuan dynasty at the hands of the Ming, continuing through both the Ming and the Qing dynasties (the latter itself founded by an Inner Asian people, the Manchu), furthering the popularity of the dao and spawning a variety of new blades. Blades with greater curvature became popular, and these new styles are collectively referred to as "peidao". During the mid-Ming these new sabers would completely replace the "jian" as a military-issue weapon. The four main types of "peidao" are:

Yanmaodao.

The "yanmaodao" or "goose-quill saber" is largely straight like the earlier "zhibeidao", with a curve appearing at the center of percussion near the blade's tip. This allows for thrusting attacks and overall handling similar to that of the "jian", while still preserving much of the dao's strengths in cutting and slashing.

Liuyedao.

The "liuyedao" or "willow leaf saber" is the most common form of Chinese saber. It first appeared during the Ming dynasty, and features a moderate curve along the length of the blade. This weapon became the standard sidearm for both cavalry and infantry, replacing the "yanmaodao", and is the sort of saber originally used by many schools of Chinese martial arts.

Piandao.

The "piandao" or "slashing saber" is a deeply curved dao meant for slashing and draw-cutting. This weapon bears a strong resemblance to the shamshir and scimitar. A fairly uncommon weapon, it was generally used by skirmishers in conjunction with a shield.

Niuweidao.

The "niuweidao" or "oxtail saber" is a heavy bladed weapon with a characteristic flaring tip. It is the archetypal "Chinese broadsword" of kung fu movies today. It is first recorded in the early 19th century (the latter half of the Qing dynasty) and only as a civilian weapon: there is no record of it being issued to troops, and it does not appear in any listing of official weaponry. Its appearance in movies and modern literature is thus often anachronistic.  Besides these four major types of dao, the "duandao" or "short dao" was also used, this being a compact weapon generally in the shape of a "liuyedao". The "dadao" saw continued use, and during the Ming dynasty the large two-handed "changdao" and "zhanmadao" were used both against the cavalry of the northern steppes and the "wokou" (pirates) of the southeast coast; these latter weapons (sometimes under different names) would continue to see limited use during the Qing period. Also during the Qing there appear weapons such as the "nandao", regional variants in name or shape of some of the above dao, and more obscure variants such as the "nine ringed broadsword", these last likely invented for street demonstrations and theatrical performances rather than for use as weapons. The word "dao" is also used in the names of several polearms that feature a single-edged blade, such as the "pudao" and "guandao".  The Chinese spear and dao ("liuyedao" and "yanmaodao") were commonly issued to infantry due to the expense of and relatively greater amount of training required for the effective use of Chinese straight sword, or "jian". Dao can often be seen depicted in period artwork worn by officers and infantry.  During the Yuan dynasty and after, some aesthetic features of Persian, Indian, and Turkish swords would appear on dao. These could include intricate carvings on the blade and "rolling pearls": small metal balls that would roll along fuller-like grooves in the blade.

Recent history.

The "dadao" was used by some Chinese militia units against Japanese invaders in the Second Sino-Japanese War, occasioning "The Sword March". The "miaodao", a descendant of the "changdao", also saw use. These were used during planned ambushes on Japanese troops because the Chinese military and patriotic resistance groups often had a shortage of firearms.  Most Chinese martial arts schools still train extensively with the dao, seeing it as a powerful conditioning tool and a versatile weapon, with self-defense techniques transferable to similarly sized objects more commonly found in the modern world, such as canes, baseball or cricket bats, for example. There are also schools that teach double sword "shuangdao" 雙刀, forms and fencing, one dao for each hand.  One measure of the proper length of the sword should be from the hilt in your hand and the tip of the blade at the brow and in some schools, the height of shoulder. Alternatively, the length of the sword should be from the middle of the throat along the length of the outstretched arm. There are also significantly larger versions of dao used for training in some Baguazhang and Taijiquan schools.  Modern wushu competitions incorporate dao routines alongside other weapons-based forms.

Dao (,, Chinese: 刀; pinyin: "dāo") are single-edged Chinese swords, primarily used for slashing and chopping. The most common form is also known as the Chinese sabre, although those with wider blades are sometimes referred to as Chinese broadswords. In China, the dao is considered one of the four traditional weapons, along with the "gun" (stick or staff), "qiang" (spear), and the "jian" (double-edged sword).

在中国,刀是一种传统冷兵器,单边开锋,以铜或钢铁等金属制成,用单手或双手舞动,以砍劈方式对敌人造成伤害。与刀类似,但是双边开锋的尖顶兵器,称为剑。


History.

1948-1961: Founding and Expansion: Elmer Winter and his law partner Aaron Scheinfeld co-founded Manpower in 1948. The pair was inspired when they found themselves looking for secretarial help to file a brief on a tight deadline with the Wisconsin Supreme Court. They raised $7,000 and opened their first storefront in Milwaukee with the name Manpower suggested by a friend.  In his book “A History of Manpower, Inc.® 1948-1976”, James D. Scheinfeld indicates that the idea for the company was, in fact, Aaron Scheinfeld's when at the close of World War II, he worked with a company on contracts to mothball military equipment and envisioned a temporary help service. By this account, in 1948 Scheinfeld conceived of Manpower, arrived at the name and early logo over lunch with friend and advertiser Marvin Frank, and invited Winter to invest as a minority stockholder and co-founder. The two incorporated the company in Delaware, and in June 1948 opened offices in downtown Milwaukee and Chicago.  By 1952, Manpower had expanded in the US to Minneapolis, Cleveland, Cincinnati, New York, Pittsburgh, and Boston; in 1954, the company offered its first franchise; in 1956, the company went international with offices in Montreal, Toronto, and the UK; and in 1957, Manpower established operations in France.  1961-1975: The White Glove Girl and Public Offering: The growing temporary employment category has been said to be a new category of work intentionally exempt from union protections. “To avoid union opposition, they developed a clever strategy, casting temp work as “women’s work,” and advertising thousands of images of young, white, middle-class women doing a variety of short-term office jobs.” In 1961, Manpower spent $1 million to place advertisements in Sunday papers across the country featuring their “White Glove Girls”. Winter described the company's strategy: "We chose white gloves as a symbol... because they seem to represent everything that is feminine, neat, and proper. They symbolize quality and efficiency.” A 1962 advertisement from TIME features model Judy Newton who was the public face of Manpower in the 1960s as “The Girl in the White Gloves”. It cites Manpower's 240 offices in the US and Canada and 15 offices in Europe. It also specifies that the company offered the following divisions: Office Services, Industrial Help, Salespower, Inc., and Technical Services.  In “The Temp Economy: From Kelly Girls to Permatemps in Postwar America”, Hatton posits that the images in these advertisements were carefully curated to be “respectable sex symbols” and very purposefully not displaying images of men or nonwhites and emphasizing that the White Glove Girls were “specially certified” as code for white & middle-class and not recent immigrants or black migrants. A 1964 advertisement claims that the White Glove Girl carries an official training certificate that she is trained in: adapting quickly to new office routine, advanced telephone technique, dictation technique, transcribing services, good filing technique, fine points of electric typing, care of office equipment, keeping work confidential, starting the work day right, office etiquette, wardrobe and grooming, and dealing with office emergencies. The ad bills Manpower as the world's largest temporary help service with over 300 offices globally.  In 1962, Manpower went public, listing shares on the New York Stock Exchange.  By 1967, Manpower advertising claimed the company has over 500 offices throughout the world. The company opened its 100th foreign office and 500th office globally in Istanbul, Turkey on February 7, 1967. On March 31, 1967, Manpower registered 300,000 shares of common stock offered for sale at $28 per share. In 1968, Manpower Technical is established, expanding to offer specialized temporary employees outside office clerical and industrial settings.  1975-1985: Parker Pen Company: On August 18, 1975, upon the retirement of co-founder Elmer Winter, the Parker Pen Company announced its acquisition of Manpower for $28.2 million. A new subsidiary of Parker would own 80% of the common stock, with the remaining 20% purchased by Mitchell S. Fromstein, Manpower Chairman of the Board.  In January 1985, Fromstein became President of Parker Pen; in October of the same year, Fromstein announced the private sale of the pen business as Manpower had grown to represent 90% of Parker's sales while the pen business struggled. Upon the completion of the sale, Parker Pen renamed itself Manpower Inc. and the sold Pen business retained the Parker Pen name.  1986-1990: Return to Public Company and Hostile Takeover by Blue Arrow: On June 27, 1986, Manpower went public once again, registering 300,000 shares of common stock with the SEC. On August 4, 1987, British firm Blue Arrow made a surprise bid to purchase Manpower for $1.2 billion in cash, or $75 a share for all 16 million outstanding shares. Blue Arrow intended to change Manpower into a full-service firm by adding permanent placement and executive recruiting services, cutting costs, and adding performance bonuses to employee compensation as they had done successfully with their 1985 purchase of Brook Street Bureau At the time, Manpower was virtually tied with Kelly Services for position as the largest American temporary services firm, each with 11%-12% market share. Blue Arrow was about 10% the size of Manpower; some analysts considered their takeover offer too low.  Manpower's board rejected the initial takeover offer, only to receive a new offer of $1.33 billion (or $82.50 a share) that they accepted on August 22. Along with the increased offer price, Blue Arrow agreed that the company would operate as a subsidiary retaining the Manpower name in the US, the Milwaukee office would remain open, and that Fromstein would stay on. In the intervening weeks before accepting the Blue Arrow offer, Fromstein attempted to negotiate a joint venture with Adia S.A. to blunt the takeover; however, the Swiss employment firm decided not to proceed. Adia later went on to merge with French firm Ecco in 1996 to form Adecco.  The company resumed trading on the NYSE as MAN on October 3, 1988.  On December 7, 1988, Fromstein resigned as President and Chief Executive of Manpower, publicly stating that the decision was mutual. However, it was Blue Arrow CEO and Chairman Antony Berry who convinced the board to oust Fromstein, forcing him out of the company. In response, Fromstein mounted an effort backed by Manpower franchises in the US to replace Berry. Just a month later in January 1989, the board removed Berry as CEO and appointed Fromstein in the Blue Arrow chief executive role while Berry remained company chairman. Berry's removal came amid poor stock performance and a scandal as the British Department of Trade and Industry investigated NatWest bank, Blue Arrow's investment bank advisor for the Manpower purchase, over "an alleged stock-price support operation following the failure of the stock flotation." Charges were later filed in what became known as the Blue Arrow Affair in November 1989.  In April 1989, Fromstein consolidated his hold on Blue Arrow when the board removed Berry completely, appointing Fromstein as chairman. Later that year, Fromstein announced the intent to rename Blue Arrow PLC to Manpower PLC, commenting "since Manpower Inc represents over 75% of the company's revenues and profits and is the multinational brand among the company's holdings, it is appropriate to make this change." Ultimately, Manpower moved the head office from Britain back to Milwaukee.  1990-2005: Reorganization as Manpower Inc: On January 31, 1990, Blue Arrow PLC announced its intent to re-incorporate in the United States as Manpower Inc. and to return its corporate headquarters to Milwaukee. This process completed in 1991 with the incorporation of Manpower Inc, a new publicly traded holding company that acquired Manpower PLC (the renamed Blue Arrow), which indirectly owned Manpower International Inc.  In 1999, Fromstein retired as president, CEO, and chairman of the board and is named chairman emeritus. Jeffrey Joerres was named the new president and CEO. The company rebranded Manpower Technical as Manpower Professional.  In January 2000, Manpower acquired Elan Group Ltd., a provider of IT staffing solutions based in the UK with operations in the Netherlands, Ireland, Switzerland, Germany, and Hong Kong, for $146.2 million. The company merged its IT staffing operations across Europe under the Elan brand. During 2000, Manpower launched The Empower Group, an independent operating division providing consulting services to multinational corporations in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and the US. On July 9, 2001, Manpower closed on its acquisition of Jefferson Wells International, Inc., a provider of professional accounting and tax services in the US and Canada, for $174 million. On December 11, 2003, Manpower announced an agreement to acquire Right Management Consultants for $488 million or $18.75 per share, into which they merged Empower.  2006-2011: Global Rebrand: In 2006, the company announced a new global brand identity with a new logo, marketing materials, and advertising campaigns. The new brand was developed by the London office of Wolff Olins, with advertising developed by WPP's Grey Worldwide in New York and media strategy and planning by sister agency MediaCom.  According to the press release, “As part of the re-branding process, Manpower has streamlined its brand architecture from over 200 brands worldwide down to only five brands that now represent its total service offering. These brands are Manpower, Manpower Professional, Elan, Jefferson Wells and Right Management... The new Manpower logo consists of five oval shapes in five different colors, which comprise the initials "MP" and reflect the range of services that Manpower now offers.”  By 2007, under the name Manpower Business Solutions (MBS), the company provided task outsourcing, vendor management, onsite HR services, and Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO). In February 2010, Manpower agreed to acquire COMSYS IT Partners, Inc for $17.65 per share or a total of $431 million in half cash and half stock. The COMSYS acquisition included their Tapfin brand, expanding Manpower's investment in RPO and Managed Service Provider (MSP) offerings. On April 5, 2010, Manpower completed the COMSYS acquisition and integrated the company with Manpower Professional IT. Tapfin MSP and RPO offerings were integrated with Manpower Business Solutions.  2011–Present: Rebranding as ManpowerGroup: In 2011, the company rebranded itself to ManpowerGroup and organized itself into four primary brands: Manpower, Experis (formed from the combination of Manpower Professional, Elan, and Jefferson Wells), Right Management, and ManpowerGroup Solutions (formerly Manpower Business Solutions). The new corporate name was part of an effort to become known as a workforce solutions company versus a traditional employment agency. The new brand name Experis was intended to emphasize the concepts of experience and expertise. New corporate and brand logos derived from the current corporate logo with work from The Martin Agency of Richmond, VA.  On September 22, 2011, ManpowerGroup acquired 70% of Proservia SA, a French IT and systems engineering company. The remaining shares were acquired by November 2011 for a total of $29.4 million.  On May 1, 2014, Jonas Prising replaced Joerres as CEO and Joerres assumed the role of executive chairman. Joerres retired on December 30, 2015 and Prising replaced him as chairman while retaining his role as CEO.  On June 1, 2015, ManpowerGroup announced the acquisition of the Australian and Singapore divisions of Greythorn and its subsidiary Marks Sattin. In August, 2015, the Experis division announced the acquisition of a majority stake in Veritaaq, a Canadian IT consulting firm. On September 3, 2015, ManpowerGroup acquired 7S Group GmbH, a German HR services firm, for $140.4 million. In 2016 and 2017, ManpowerGroup purchased several divisions of Ciber in Europe: Ciber Netherlands, Ciber Norway, and Ciber Spain.

Subsidiaries.

ManpowerGroup owns hundreds of subsidiary companies around the world, the majority of which operate under the company's four primary brands: Manpower, Experis, Right Management, or ManpowerGroup Solutions. The company does, however, operate several independent brands and joint ventures.  These subsidiaries include:

ManpowerGroup (formerly known as Manpower Inc.) is a Fortune 500 American multinational corporation headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Founded in 1948 by Elmer Winter and Aaron Scheinfeld, ManpowerGroup is the third-largest staffing firm in the world behind Swiss firm Adecco and Dutch firm Randstad. The company provides administrative & support services, professional services, and business services through its four primary brands: Manpower (contingent staffing & permanent recruitment), Experis (professional resourcing and project-based solutions), Right Management (career management, workforce consulting, and training & development), and ManpowerGroup Solutions (managed services and outsourcing).

万宝华股份有限公司,简称万宝华(),是在1948年由美国商人和Aaron Scheinfeld(亚伦·施特富)创立。其主要提供一站式临时工、技术职位等工作。总部位于美国威斯康辛州密尔沃基。现时董事长及首席执行官。