title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's legs began to straighten on their own when she was 14, but conflicts with Aunt Duke never abated. Whippings turned into being thrown out of the house for slights and manufactured infractions and spending many nights with one of her nearby aunts. The final confrontation caused her to move into her own rented house for a month, but she was lonely and unsure of how to support herself. After two aunts, Hannah and Alice, moved to Chicago, Jackson's family, concerned for her, urged Hannah to take her back there with her after a Thanksgiving visit.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: In a very cold December, Jackson arrived in Chicago. For a week she was miserably homesick, unable to move off the couch until Sunday when her aunts took her to Greater Salem Baptist Church, an environment she felt at home in immediately, later stating it was "the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me". When the pastor called the congregation to witness, or declare one's experience with God, Jackson was struck by the spirit and launched into a lively rendition of "Hand Me Down My Silver Trumpet, Gabriel", to an impressed but somewhat bemused audience. The power of Jackson's voice was readily apparent but the congregation was unused to such an animated delivery. She was nonetheless invited to join the 50-member choir, and a vocal group formed by the pastor's sons, Prince, Wilbur, and Robert Johnson, and Louise Lemon. They performed as a quartet, the Johnson Singers, with Prince as the pianist: Chicago's first black gospel group. Initially they hosted familiar programs singing at socials and Friday night musicals. They wrote and performed moral plays at Greater Salem with offerings going toward the church.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's arrival in Chicago occurred during the Great Migration, a massive movement of black Southerners to Northern cities. Between 1910 and 1970, hundreds of thousands of rural Southern blacks moved to Chicago, transforming a neighborhood in the South Side into Bronzeville, a black city within a city which was mostly self sufficient, prosperous, and teeming in the 1920s. This movement caused white flight with whites moving to suburbs, leaving established white churches and synagogues with dwindling members. Their mortgages were taken over by black congregations in good position to settle in Bronzeville. Members of these churches were, in Jackson's term, "society Negroes" who were well educated and eager to prove their successful assimilation into white American society. Musical services tended to be formal, presenting solemnly delivered hymns written by Isaac Watts and other European composers. Shouting and clapping were generally not allowed as they were viewed as undignified. Special programs and musicals tended to feature sophisticated choral arrangements to prove the quality of the choir.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: This difference between the styles in Northern urban churches and the South was vividly illustrated when the Johnson Singers appeared at a church one evening and Jackson stood out to sing solo, scandalizing the pastor with her exuberant shouts. He accused her of blasphemy, bringing "twisting jazz" into the church. Jackson was momentarily shocked before retorting, "This is the way we "sing" down South!" The minister was not alone in his apprehension. She was often so involved in singing she was mostly unaware how she moved her body. To hide her movements, pastors urged her to wear loose fitting robes which she often lifted a few inches from the ground, and they accused her of employing "snake hips" while dancing when the spirit moved her. Enduring another indignity, Jackson scraped together four dollars () to pay a talented black operatic tenor for a professional assessment of her voice. She was dismayed when the professor chastised her: "You've got to learn to stop hollering. It will take time to build up your voice. The way you sing is not a credit to the Negro race. You've got to learn to sing songs so that white people can understand them."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Soon Jackson found the mentor she was seeking. Thomas A. Dorsey, a seasoned blues musician trying to transition to gospel music, trained Jackson for two months, persuading her to sing slower songs to maximize their emotional effect. Dorsey had a motive: he needed a singer to help sell his sheet music. He recruited Jackson to stand on Chicago street corners with him and sing his songs, hoping to sell them for ten cents a page. It was not the financial success Dorsey hoped for, but their collaboration resulted in the unintentional conception of gospel blues solo singing in Chicago.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Steadily, the Johnson Singers were asked to perform at other church services and revivals. When larger, more established black churches expressed little interest in the Johnson Singers, they were courted by smaller storefront churches and were happy to perform there, though less likely to be paid as much or at all. Newly arrived migrants attended these storefront churches; the services were less formal and reminiscent of what they had left behind. Jackson found an eager audience in new arrivals, one calling her "a fresh wind from the down-home religion." Black Chicago was hit hard by the Great Depression, driving church attendance throughout the city, which Jackson credited with starting her career. Gradually and by necessity, larger churches became more open to Jackson's singing style. As many of them were suddenly unable to meet their mortgage notes, adapting their musical programs became a viable way to attract and keep new members.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: When she first arrived in Chicago, Jackson dreamed of being a nurse or a teacher, but before she could enroll in school she had to take over Aunt Hannah's job when she became ill. Jackson became a laundress and took a series of domestic and factory jobs while the Johnson Singers began to make a meager living, earning from $1.50 to $8 (equivalent to $ to $ in ) a night. Steady work became a second priority to singing. Jackson began calling herself a "fish and bread singer", working for herself and God. She made her first recordings in 1931, singles that she intended to sell at National Baptist Convention meetings, though she was mostly unsuccessful. But as her audiences grew each Sunday, she began to get hired as a soloist to sing at funerals and political rallies for Louis B. Anderson and William L. Dawson. In 1932, on Dawson's request, she sang for Franklin D. Roosevelt's presidential campaign. She had become the only professional gospel singer in Chicago. Sometimes she made $10 a week () in what historian Michael Harris calls "an almost unheard-of professionalization of one's sacred calling".


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: As opportunities came to her, an extraordinary moral code directed Jackson's career choices. Her lone vice was frequenting movie and vaudeville theaters until her grandfather visited one summer and had a stroke while standing in the sun on a Chicago street. Jackson pleaded with God to spare him, swearing she would never go to a theater again. He survived and Jackson kept her promise, refusing to attend as a patron and rejecting opportunities to sing in theaters for her entire career. She furthermore vowed to sing gospel exclusively despite intense pressure. In 1935, Jackson met Isaac "Ike" Hockenhull, a chemist working as a postman during the Depression. Impressed with his attention and manners, Jackson married him after a year-long courtship. Hockenhull's mother gave the couple 200 formulas for homemade hair and skincare products she had sold door to door. Hockenhull and Jackson made cosmetics in their kitchen and she sold jars when she traveled. It was not steady work, and the cosmetics did not sell well. At one point Hockenhull had been laid off and he and Jackson had less than a dollar between them. He saw that auditions for "The Swing Mikado", a jazz-flavored retelling of the Gilbert and Sullivan opera, were taking place. He demanded she go; the role would pay $60 a week (). Plus, he saw no value in singing gospel. He did not consider it artful. He had repeatedly urged her to get formal training and put her voice to better use. She refused and they argued about it often. Wracked by guilt, she attended the audition, later calling the experience "miserable" and "painful". When she got home she learned that the role was offered to her, but when Hockenhull informed her he also secured a job she immediately rejected the role to his disbelief. She furthermore turned down Louis Armstrong and Earl "Fatha" Hines when they offered her jobs singing with their bands.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: In 1937, Jackson met Mayo "Ink" Williams, a music producer who arranged a session with Decca Records. She recorded four singles: "God's Gonna Separate the Wheat From the Tares", "You Sing On, My Singer", "God Shall Wipe Away All Tears", and "Keep Me Every Day". Jackson told neither her husband or Aunt Hannah, who shared her house, of this session. The records' sales were weak, but were distributed to jukeboxes in New Orleans, one of which Jackson's entire family huddled around in a bar, listening to her again and again. Decca said they would record her further if she sang blues, and once more Jackson refused.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: The Johnson Singers folded in 1938, but as the Depression lightened Jackson saved some money, earned a beautician's license from Madam C. J. Walker's school, and bought a beauty salon in the heart of Bronzeville. It was almost immediately successful and the center of gospel activity. Singers, male and female, visited while Jackson cooked for large groups of friends and customers on a two-burner stove in the rear of the salon. It was located across the street from Pilgrim Baptist Church, where Thomas Dorsey had become music director. Dorsey proposed a series of performances to promote his music and her voice and she agreed. They toured off and on until 1951. It was regular and, they felt, necessary work. Dorsey accompanied Jackson on piano, often writing songs specifically for her. His background as a blues player gave him extensive experience improvising and he encouraged Jackson to develop her skills during their performances by handing her lyrics and playing chords while she created melodies, sometimes performing 20 or more songs this way. She was able to emote and relate to audiences profoundly well; her goal was to "wreck" a church, or cause a state of spiritual pandemonium among the audience which she did consistently. At one event, in an ecstatic moment Dorsey jumped up from the piano and proclaimed, "Mahalia Jackson is the Empress of gospel singers! She's the "Empress"! The Empress!!"


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: A constant worker and a shrewd businesswoman, Jackson became the choir director at St. Luke Baptist Church. She bought a building as a landlord, then found the salon so successful she had to hire help to care for it when she traveled on weekends. On tour, she counted heads and tickets to ensure she was being paid fairly. What she was able to earn and save was done in spite of Hockenhull. A compulsive gambler, he took home a large payout asking Jackson to hide it so he would not gamble it. She laid the stash in flat bills under a rug assuming he would never look there, then went to a weekend performance in Detroit. When she returned, she realized he had found it and used it to buy a race horse. In 1943, he brought home a new Buick for her that he promptly stopped paying for. She paid for it entirely, then learned he had used it as collateral for a loan when she saw it being repossessed in the middle of the day on the busiest street in Bronzeville. They divorced amicably.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Each engagement Jackson took was farther from Chicago in a nonstop string of performances. In 1946 she appeared at the Golden Gate Ballroom in Harlem. In attendance was Art Freeman, a music scout for Apollo Records, a company catering to black artists and audiences concentrating mostly on jazz and blues. Apollo's chief executive Bess Berman was looking to broaden their representation to other genres, including gospel. Berman signed Jackson to a four-record session, allowing Jackson to pick the songs. Her first release on Apollo, "Wait 'til My Change Comes" backed with "I'm Going to Tell God All About it One of These Days" did not sell well. Neither did her second, "I Want to Rest" with "He Knows My Heart". Berman asked Jackson to record blues and she refused. Berman told Freeman to release Jackson from any more recordings but Freeman asked for one more session to record the song Jackson sang as a warmup at the Golden Gate Ballroom concert. "Move On Up a Little Higher" was recorded in two parts, one for each side of the 78 rpm record.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Meanwhile, Chicago radio host Louis "Studs" Terkel heard Jackson's records in a music shop and was transfixed. He bought and played them repeatedly on his show. Terkel introduced his mostly white listeners to gospel music and Jackson herself, interviewing her and asking her to sing live. "Move On Up a Little Higher" was released in 1947, selling 50,000 copies in Chicago and 2 million nationwide. It landed at the number two spot on the "Billboard" charts for two weeks, another first for gospel music. The best any gospel artist could expect to sell was 100,000. Berman set Jackson up for another recording session, where she sang "Even Me" (one million sold), and "Dig a Little Deeper" (just under one million sold). Instantly Jackson was in high demand. A position as the official soloist of the National Baptist Convention was created for her, and her audiences multiplied to the tens of thousands. She campaigned for Harry Truman, earning her first invitation to the White House. Time constraints forced her to give up the choir director position at St. Luke Baptist Church and sell the beauty shop. True to her own rule, she turned down lucrative appearances at New York City institutions the Apollo Theater and the Village Vanguard, where she was promised $5,000 a week ().


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: The next year, promoter Joe Bostic approached her to perform in a gospel music revue at Carnegie Hall, a venue most often reserved for classical and well established artists such as Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington. Jackson was intimidated by this offer and dreaded the approaching date. Gospel had never been performed at Carnegie. Jackson was the final artist to appear that evening. After a shaky start, she gave multiple encores and received voluminous praise: Nora Holt, a music critic with the black newspaper "The New York Amsterdam News", wrote that Jackson's rendition of "City Called Heaven" was filled with "suffering ecstasy" and that Jackson was a "genius unspoiled". John Hammond, critic at the "Daily Compass", praised Jackson's powerful voice which "she used ... with reckless abandon". The revue was so successful it was made an annual event with Jackson headlining for years. The show that took place in 1951 broke attendance records set by Goodman and Arturo Toscanini.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: By chance, a French jazz fan named Hugues Panassié visited the Apollo Records office in New York and discovered Jackson's music in the waiting room. He bought her records, took them home and played them on French public radio. The Académie Charles Cros awarded Jackson their Grand Prix du Disque for "I Can Put My Trust in Jesus"; Jackson was the first gospel singer to receive this award. During the same time, Jackson and blues guitarist John Lee Hooker were invited to a ten-day symposium hosted by jazz historian Marshall Stearns who gathered participants to discuss how to define jazz. Jackson was accompanied by her pianist Mildred Falls, together performing 21 songs with question and answer sessions from the audience, mostly filled with writers and intellectuals. As Jackson's singing was often considered jazz or blues with religious lyrics, she fielded questions about the nature of gospel blues and how she developed her singing style. Toward the end, a participant asked Jackson what parts of gospel music come from jazz, and she replied, "Baby, don't you know the Devil stole the beat from the "Lord?"" Those in the audience wrote about Jackson in several publications. Her records were sent to the UK, traded there among jazz fans, earning Jackson a cult following on both sides of the Atlantic, and she was invited to tour Europe.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson had her first television appearance on "Toast of the Town" with Ed Sullivan in 1952. As she prepared to embark on her first tour of Europe, she began having difficulty breathing during and after performances and had severe abdominal cramping. She continued with her plans for the tour where she was very warmly received. In jazz magazine "DownBeat", Mason Sargent called the tour "one of the most remarkable, in terms of audience reaction, ever undertaken by an American artist". Her appearance at the Royal Albert Hall in London made her the first gospel singer to perform there since the Fisk Jubilee Singers in 1872, and she pre-sold 20,000 copies of "Silent Night" in Copenhagen. She played numerous shows while in pain, sometimes collapsing backstage. She lost a significant amount of weight during the tour, finally having to cancel. When she returned to the U.S., she had a hysterectomy and doctors found numerous granulomas in her abdomen. She was diagnosed with sarcoidosis, a systemic inflammatory disease caused by immune cells forming lumps in organs throughout the body. Sarcoidosis is not curable, though it can be treated, and following the surgery, Jackson's doctors were cautiously optimistic that with treatment she could carry on as normal.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: In 1954, Jackson learned that Berman had been withholding royalties and had allowed her contract with Apollo to expire. Mitch Miller offered her a $50,000-a-year () four-year contract, and Jackson became the first gospel artist to sign with Columbia Records, a much larger company with the ability to promote her nationally. Miller attempted to make her repertoire more appealing to white listeners, asking her to record ballads and classical songs, but again she refused. "Rusty Old Halo" became her first Columbia single, and "DownBeat" declared Jackson "the greatest spiritual singer now alive". Columbia worked with a local radio affiliate in Chicago to create a half hour radio program, "The Mahalia Jackson Show". Although it got an overwhelmingly positive reception and producers were eager to syndicate it nationally, it was cut to ten minutes long, then canceled. She appeared on a local television program, also titled "The Mahalia Jackson Show", which again got a positive reception but was canceled for lack of sponsors. Despite white people beginning to attend her shows and sending fan letters, executives at CBS were concerned they would lose advertisers from Southern states who objected to a program with a black person as the primary focus.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson attracted the attention of the William Morris Agency, a firm that promoted her by booking her in large concert halls and television appearances with Arthur Godfrey, Dinah Shore, Bing Crosby, and Perry Como in the 1950s. Her reverence and upbeat, positive demeanor made her desirable to progressive producers and hosts eager to feature a black person on television. She appeared at the 1956 Democratic National Convention, silencing a rowdy hall of attendees with "I See God". Miller, who was in attendance, was awed by it, noting "there wasn't a dry eye in the house when she got through". Jackson broke into films playing a missionary in "St. Louis Blues" (1958), and a funeral singer in "Imitation of Life" (1959). As demand for her rose, she traveled extensively, performing 200 dates a year for ten years. She and her entourage of singers and accompanists toured deeper into the South, encountering difficulty finding safe, clean places to sleep, eat, and buy gas due to Jim Crow laws. Sometimes they had to sleep in Jackson's car, a Cadillac she had purchased to make long trips more comfortable. Jackson remembered, "The looks of anger at the sight of us colored folks sitting in a nice car were frightening to see... It got so we were living on bags of fresh fruit during the day and driving half the night, and I was so exhausted by the time I was supposed to sing, I was almost dizzy." Jackson began to gain weight. She also developed peculiar habits regarding money. As a black woman, Jackson found it often impossible to cash checks when away from Chicago. Her contracts therefore demanded she be paid in cash, often forcing her to carry tens of thousands of dollars in suitcases and in her undergarments.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Each event in her career and personal life broke another racial barrier. She often asked ushers to allow white and black people to sit together, sometimes asking the audiences to integrate themselves by telling them that they were all Christian brothers and sisters. After years of receiving complaints about being loud when she practiced in her apartment, even in the building she owned, Jackson bought a house in the all-white Chatham Village neighborhood of Chicago. When this news spread, she began receiving death threats. The day she moved in her front window was shot. Jackson asked Richard Daley, the mayor of Chicago, for help and Daley ordered police presence outside her house for a year. A few months later, Jackson appeared live on the television special "Wide Wide World" singing Christmas carols from Mount Moriah, her childhood church in New Orleans. The broadcast earned excellent reviews, and Jackson received congratulatory telegrams from across the nation. Yet the next day she was unable to get a taxi or shop along Canal Street.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: While attending the National Baptist Convention in 1956, Jackson met Martin Luther King Jr. and Ralph Abernathy, both ministers emerging as organizers protesting segregation. Jackson often sang to support worthy causes for no charge, such as raising money to buy a church an organ, robes for choirs, or sponsoring missionaries. She extended this to civil rights causes, becoming the most prominent gospel musician associated with King and the civil rights movement. She raised money for the United Negro College Fund and sang at the Prayer Pilgrimage Breakfast in 1957. She later stated she felt God had especially prepared King "with the education and the warmth of spirit to do His work". Motivated by her sincere appreciation that civil rights protests were being organized within churches and its participants inspired by hymns, she traveled to Montgomery, Alabama to sing in support of the ongoing bus boycott. She and Mildred Falls stayed at Abernathy's house in a room that was bombed four months later. After hearing that black children in Virginia were unable to attend school due to integration conflicts, she threw them an ice cream party from Chicago, singing to them over a telephone line attached to a public address system. She similarly supported a group of black sharecroppers in Tennessee facing eviction for voting.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: As gospel music became more popular – primarily due to her influence – singers began appearing at non-religious venues as a way to spread a Christian message to nonbelievers. Jackson appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1957 and 1958, and in the latter's concert film, "Jazz on a Summer's Day" (1959). Her continued television appearances with Steve Allen, Red Skelton, Milton Berle, and Jimmy Durante kept her in high demand. She toured Europe again in 1961 with incredible success, mobbed in several cities and needing police escorts. All dates in Germany were sold out weeks in advance. In Essen, she was called to give so many encores that she eventually changed into her street clothes and the stage hands removed the microphone. Still she sang one more song. The highlight of her trip was visiting the Holy Land, where she knelt and prayed at Calvary.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: When King was arrested and sentenced to four months hard labor, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy intervened, earning Jackson's loyal support. She began campaigning for him, saying, "I feel that I'm a part of this man's hopes. He lifts my spirit and makes me feel a part of the land I live in." Her clout and loyalty to Kennedy earned her an invitation to sing "The Star-Spangled Banner" at his inaugural ball in 1961. Months later, she helped raise $50,000 for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Jackson lent her support to King and other ministers in 1963 after their successful campaign to end segregation in Birmingham by holding a fundraising rally to pay for protestors' bail. By this time she was a personal friend of King and his wife Coretta, often hosting them when they visited Chicago, and spending Thanksgiving with their family in Atlanta. King considered Jackson's house a place that he could truly relax. She appeared at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom to sing "I've Been 'Buked and I've Been Scorned" on King's request, then "How I Got Over". Three months later, while rehearsing for an appearance on Danny Kaye's television show, Jackson was inconsolable upon learning that Kennedy had been assassinated, believing that he died fighting for the rights of black Americans.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson toured Europe again in 1964, mobbed in several cities and proclaiming, "I thought I was the Beatles!" in Utrecht. She appeared in the film "The Best Man" (1964), and attended a ceremony acknowledging Lyndon Johnson's inauguration at the White House, becoming friends with Lady Bird. When at home, she attempted to remain approachable and maintain her characteristic sincerity. Mostly in secret, Jackson had paid for the education of several young people as she felt poignant regret that her own schooling was cut short. Stories of her gifts and generosity spread. Her phone number continued to be listed in the Chicago public telephone book, and she received calls nonstop from friends, family, business associates, and strangers asking for money, advice on how to break into the music industry, or general life decisions they should make. Her house had a steady flow of traffic that she welcomed. Jackson had thoroughly enjoyed cooking since childhood, and took great pleasure in feeding all of her visitors, some of them staying days or weeks on her request.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Through friends, Jackson met Sigmond Galloway, a former musician in the construction business living in Gary, Indiana. Despite Jackson's hectic schedule and the constant companions she had in her entourage of musicians, friends, and family, she expressed loneliness and began courting Galloway when she had free time. As a complete surprise to her closest friends and associates, Jackson married him in her living room in 1964. Only a few weeks later, while driving home from a concert in St. Louis, she found herself unable to stop coughing. She checked herself into a hospital in Chicago. Since the cancellation of her tour to Europe in 1952, Jackson experienced occasional bouts of fatigue and shortness of breath. As her schedule became fuller and more demands placed on her, these episodes became more frequent. This time, the publicly disclosed diagnosis was heart strain and exhaustion, but in private Jackson's doctors told her that she had had a heart attack and sarcoidosis was now in her heart.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's recovery took a full year during which she was unable to tour or record, ultimately losing . From this point on she was plagued with near-constant fatigue, bouts of tachycardia, and high blood pressure as her condition advanced. Jackson was often depressed and frustrated at her own fragility, but she took the time to send Lyndon Johnson a telegram urging him to protect marchers in Selma, Alabama when she saw news coverage of Bloody Sunday. Galloway proved to be unreliable, leaving for long periods during Jackson's convalescence, then upon his return insisting she was imagining her symptoms. He tried taking over managerial duties from agents and promoters despite being inept. They argued over money; Galloway attempted to strike Jackson on two different occasions, the second one thwarted when Jackson ducked and he broke his hand hitting a piece of furniture behind her. The marriage dissolved and she announced her intention to divorce. He responded by requesting a jury trial, rare for divorces, in an attempt to embarrass her by publicizing the details of their marital problems. When Galloway's infidelities were proven in testimony, the judge declined to award him any of Jackson's assets or properties.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Her doctors cleared her to work and Jackson began recording and performing again, pushing her limitations by giving two- and three-hour concerts. She performed exceptionally well belying her personal woes and ongoing health problems. When not on tour, she concentrated her efforts on building two philanthropies: the Mahalia Jackson Foundation which eventually paid tuition for 50 college students, and the culmination of a dream she had for ten years: a nondenominational temple for young people in Chicago to learn gospel music. As she organized two large benefit concerts for these causes, she was once more heartbroken upon learning of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. She attended the funeral in Atlanta where she gave one of her most memorable performances of "Take My Hand, Precious Lord". With this, Jackson retired from political work and personal endorsements.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Branching out into business, Jackson partnered with comedian Minnie Pearl in a chain of restaurants called Mahalia Jackson's Chicken Dinners and lent her name to a line of canned foods. She purchased a lavish condominium in Chicago overlooking Lake Michigan and set up room for Galloway, whom she was considering remarrying. At 58 years old, she returned to New Orleans, finally allowed to stay as a guest in the upscale Royal Orleans hotel, receiving red carpet treatment. She embarked on a tour of Europe in 1968, which she cut short for health reasons, but she returned in 1969 to adoring audiences. Now experiencing inflammation in her eyes and painful cramps in her legs and hands, she undertook successful tours of the Caribbean, still counting the house to ensure she was being paid fairly, and Liberia in West Africa. In 1971, Jackson made television appearances with Johnny Cash and Flip Wilson. For three weeks she toured Japan, becoming the first Western singer since the end of World War II to give a private concert for the Imperial Family. The U.S. State Department sponsored a visit to India, where she played Kolkata, New Delhi, Madras, and Mumbai, all of them sold out within two hours. In New Delhi, she had an unexpected audience with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who declared, "I will never hear a greater voice; I will never know a greater person." While touring Europe months later, Jackson became ill in Germany and flew home to Chicago where she was hospitalized. In January 1972, she received surgery to remove a bowel obstruction and died in recovery.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Although news outlets had reported on her health problems and concert postponements for years, her death came as a shock to many of her fans. She received a funeral service at Greater Salem Baptist Church in Chicago where she was still a member. Fifty thousand people paid their respects, many of them lining up in the snow the night before, and her peers in gospel singing performed in her memory the next morning. The day after, Mayor Richard Daley and other politicians and celebrities gave their eulogies at the Arie Crown Theater with 6,000 in attendance. Her body was returned to New Orleans where she lay in state at Rivergate Auditorium under a military and police guard, and 60,000 people viewed her casket. On the way to Providence Memorial Park in Metairie, Louisiana, the funeral procession passed Mount Moriah Baptist Church, where her music was played over loudspeakers.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Though the gospel blues style Jackson employed was common among soloists in black churches, to many white jazz fans it was novel. As she was the most prominent — and sometimes the only gospel singer many white listeners knew — she often received requests to define the style and explain how and why she sang as she did. Jackson was mostly untrained, never learning to read or write musical notation, so her style was heavily marked by instinct. She answered questions to the best of her ability though often responded with lack of surety, saying, "All I ever learned was just to sing the way I feel... off-beat, on the beat, between beats — however the Lord lets it come out." When pressed for clearer descriptions, she replied, "Child, I don't know how I do it myself."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's voice is noted for being energetic and powerful, ranging from contralto to soprano, which she switched between rapidly. She resisted labeling her voice range instead calling it "real strong and clear". She used bent or "worried" notes typical of blues, the sound of which jazz aficionado Bucklin Moon described as "an almost solid wall of blue tonality". She moaned, hummed, and improvised extensively with rhythm and melody, often embellishing notes with a prodigious use of melisma, or singing several tones per syllable. Author Anthony Heilbut called it a "weird ethereal sound, part moan, part failed operatics". Gospel historian Horace Boyer attributes Jackson's "aggressive style and rhythmic ascension" to the Pentecostal congregation she heard as a child, saying Jackson was "never a Baptist singer". He continues: "bending a note here, chopping off a note there, singing through rest spots and ornamenting the melodic line at will, [Jackson] confused pianists but fascinated those who played by ear". Bucklin Moon was enamored with her singing, writing that the embellishments Jackson added "take your breath away. As a member of a Sanctified Church in Mount Vernon once told me: 'Mahalia, she add more flowers and feathers than anybody, and they all is exactly right.' She breaks every rule of concert singing, taking breaths in the middle of a word and sometimes garbling the words altogether, but the full-throated feeling and expression are seraphic." Writer Ralph Ellison noted how she blended precise diction with a thick New Orleans accent, describing the effect as "almost of the academy one instant, and of the broadest cotton field dialect the next".


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: By her own admission and in the opinion of multiple critics and scholars, Bessie Smith's singing style was clearly dominant in Jackson's voice. In "Melody Maker", Max Jones contrasted the two: "Whereas Bessie's singing can sound harsh and unlovely, even to jazz students, on first acquaintance, Mahalia's voice is obviously an instrument of uncommon beauty... Her bursts of power and sudden rhythmic drives build up to a pitch that leave you unprepared to listen afterwards to any but the greatest of musicians." Other singers made their mark. In her early days in Chicago, Jackson saved her money to buy records by classical singers Roland Hayes, Grace Moore, and Lawrence Tibbett, attributing her diction, breathing, and she said, "what little I know of technique" to these singers.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Improvisation was a significant part of Jackson's live performances both in concert halls and churches. She often stretched what would be a five-minute recording to twenty-five minutes to achieve maximum emotional effect. In black churches, this was a regular practice among gospel soloists who sought to evoke an emotional purging in the audience during services. White and non-Christian audiences also felt this resonance. After one concert, critic Nat Hentoff wrote, "The conviction and strength of her rendition had a strange effect on the secularists present, who were won over to Mahalia if not to her message. Most of them were amazed at the length of time after the concert during which the sound of her voice remained active in the mind." Jackson explained that as God worked through her she became more impassioned during a song, and that what she felt was right to do in the moment was what was necessary for the audience. As her career advanced, she found it difficult to adjust to the time constraints in recording and television appearances, saying, "When I sing I don't go by the score. I lose something when I do. I don't want to be told I can sing just so long. I make it 'til that passion is passed. When I become conscious, I can't do it good."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson estimated that she sold 22 million records in her career. Her four singles for Decca and seventy-one for Apollo are widely acclaimed by scholars as defining gospel blues. The earliest are marked by minimal accompaniment with piano and organ. Apollo added acoustic guitar, backup singers, bass, and drums in the 1950s. Her singing is lively, energetic, and emotional, using "a voice in the prime of its power and command", according to author Bob Darden. Although hearing herself on Decca recordings years later prompted Jackson to declare they are "not very good", Viv Broughton calls "Keep Me Every Day" a "gospel masterpiece", and Anthony Heilbut praises its "wonderful artless purity and conviction", saying that in her Decca records, her voice "was at its loveliest, rich and resonant, with little of the vibrato and neo-operatic obbligatos of later years". Likewise, he calls Jackson's Apollo records "uniformly brilliant", choosing "Even Me", "Just As I Am", "City Called Heaven", and "I Do, Don't You" as perfect examples of her phrasing and contralto range, having an effect that is "angelic but never saccharine". "The New Grove Gospel, Blues, and Jazz" cites the Apollo songs "In the Upper Room", "Let the Power of the Holy Ghost Fall on Me", and "I'm Glad Salvation is Free" as prime examples of the "majesty" of Jackson's voice. According to musicologist Wilfrid Mellers, Jackson's early recordings demonstrate a "sound that is all-embracing, as secure as the womb, from which singer and listener may be reborn. The breathtaking beauty of the voice and superbly controlled transitions from speech to prayer to song heal and anneal."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Columbia Records, then the largest recording company in the U.S., presented Jackson as the "World's Greatest Gospel Singer" in the 28 albums they released. She was marketed to appeal to a wide audience of listeners who, despite all her accomplishments up to 1954, had never heard of her. In contrast to the series of singles from Apollo, Columbia released themed albums that included liner notes and photos. Compared to other artists at Columbia, Jackson was allowed considerable input in what she would record, but Mitch Miller and producer George Avakian persuaded her with varying success to broaden her appeal to listeners of different faiths. Though her early records at Columbia had a similar sound to her Apollo records, the music accompanying Jackson at Columbia later included orchestras, electric guitars, backup singers, and drums, the overall effect of which was more closely associated with light pop music. She was marketed similarly to jazz musicians, but her music at Columbia ultimately defied categorization. Her albums interspersed familiar compositions by Thomas Dorsey and other gospel songwriters with songs considered generally inspirational. These included "You'll Never Walk Alone" written by Rodgers and Hammerstein for the 1945 musical "Carousel", "Trees" based on the poem by Joyce Kilmer, "Danny Boy", and the patriotic songs "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", among others. "The Cambridge Companion to Blues and Gospel Music" describes Jackson's Columbia recordings as "toned down and polished" compared to the rawer, more minimalist sound at Apollo. Scholar Mark Burford praises "When I Wake Up In Glory" as "one of the crowning achievements of her career as a recording artist", but Heilbut calls her Columbia recordings of "When the Saints Go Marching In" and "The Lord's Prayer", "uneventful material". Jackson agreed somewhat, acknowledging that her sound was being commercialized, calling some of these recordings "sweetened-water stuff". When the themes of her songs were outwardly religious, some critics felt the delivery was at times less lively. John Hammond, who helped secure Jackson's contract with Columbia, told her if she signed with them many of her black fans would not relate well to the music. This turned out to be true and as a result, Jackson created a distinct performing style for Columbia recordings that was markedly different from her live performances, which remained animated and lively, both in churches and concert halls.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: In live performances, Jackson was renowned for her physicality and the extraordinary emotional connections she held with her audiences. "The New York Times" stated she was a "massive, stately, even majestic woman, [who] possessed an awesome presence that was apparent in whatever milieu she chose to perform." So caught up in the spirit was she while singing, she often wept, fell on her knees, bowed, skipped, danced, clapped spontaneously, patted her sides and stomach, and particularly in churches, roamed the aisles to sing directly to individuals. All of these were typical of the services in black churches though Jackson's energy was remarkable. An experiment wearing a wig with her robes went awry during a show in the 1950s when she sang so frenetically she flung it off mid-performance. Anthony Heilbut writes that "some of her gestures are dramatically jerky, suggesting instant spirit possession", and called her performances "downright terrifying. At her best, Mahalia builds these songs to a frenzy of intensity almost demanding a release in holler and shout. When singing them she may descend to her knees, her combs scattering like so many cast-out demons." Jackson defended her idiosyncrasies, commenting, "How can you sing of amazing grace, how can you sing prayerfully of heaven and earth and all God's wonders without using your hands? My hands, my feet, I throw my whole body to say all that is within me. The mind and the voice by themselves are not sufficient."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: In line with improvising music, Jackson did not like to prepare what she would sing before concerts, and would often change song preferences based on what she was feeling at the moment, saying, "There's something the public reaches into me for, and there seems to be something in each audience that I can feel. I can feel whether there's a low spirit. Some places I go, up-tempo songs don't go, and other places, sad songs aren't right." She had an uncanny ability to elicit the same emotions from her audiences that she transmitted in her singing. "People Today" commented that "When Mahalia sings, audiences do more than just listen—they undergo a profoundly moving emotional experience." Jackson used "house wreckers", or songs that induced long tumultuous moments with audiences weeping, shouting, and moaning, especially in black churches. Gospel singer Evelyn Gaye recalled touring with her in 1938 when Jackson often sang "If You See My Savior Tell Him That You Saw Me", saying, "and the people, look like they were just awed by it, on a higher plane, gone. She had that type of rocking and that holy dance she'd get into—look like the people just submitted to it." White audiences also wept and responded emotionally. According to jazz writer Raymond Horricks, instead of preaching to listeners Jackson spoke about her personal faith and spiritual experiences "immediately and directly... making it difficult for them to turn away". Promoter Joe Bostic was in the audience of the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, an outdoor concert that occurred during a downpour, and stated, "It was the most fantastic tribute to the hypnotic power of great artistry I have ever encountered. Nothing like it have I ever seen in my life. Those people sat... they forgot... they were completely entranced."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: A significant part of Jackson's appeal was her demonstrated earnestness in her religious conviction. Bostic spoke of her abiding faith: "Mahalia never became so sophisticated that she lost her humility, her relationship with God as a divine being. She never got beyond that point; and many times, many times, you were amazed — at least I was, because she was such a tough business woman." During her tour of the Middle East, Jackson stood back in wonder while visiting Jericho, and road manager David Haber asked her if she truly thought trumpets brought down its walls. Jackson replied honestly, "I believe Joshua did pray to God, and the sun stood still. I believe everything." Gospel singer Cleophus Robinson asserted, "There never was any pretense, no sham about her. Wherever you met her it was like receiving a letter from home. She was a warm, carefree personality who gave you the feeling that you could relax and let your hair down whenever you were around her — backstage with her or in her home where she'd cook up some good gumbo for you whenever she had the time. A lot of people tried to make Mahalia act 'proper', and they'd tell her about her diction and such things but she paid them no mind. She never denied her background and she never lost her 'down home' sincerity." Television host Ed Sullivan said, "She was just so darned kind to everybody. When Mahalia sang, she took command. The band, the stage crew, the other performers, the ushers — they were all rooting for her. When she came out, she could be your mother or your sister. I mean, she wasn't obsequious, you know; she was a star among other stars. Other people may not have wanted to be deferential, but they couldn't help it. This woman was just great." Commenting on her personal intimacy, Neil Goodwin of "The Daily Express" wrote after attending her 1961 concert at the Royal Albert Hall, "Mahalia Jackson sang to "ME" last night." Others wrote of her ability to give listeners goosebumps or make the hair on their neck tingle.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Until 1946, Jackson used an assortment of pianists for recording and touring, choosing anyone who was convenient and free to go with her. As her career progressed, she found it necessary to have a pianist available at a moment's notice, someone talented enough to improvise with her yet steeped in religious music. Jackson found this in Mildred Falls (1921—1974), who accompanied her for 25 years. Falls is often acknowledged as a significant part of Jackson's sound and therefore her success. She was born Mildred Carter in Magnolia, Mississippi, learning to play on her family's upright piano, working with church choirs, and moving to California with a gospel singing group. A broken marriage resulted in her return to Chicago in 1947 when she was referred to Jackson who set up a brief training with Robert Anderson, a longtime member of Jackson's entourage. Falls accompanied her in nearly every performance and recording thereafter.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Always on the lookout for new material, Jackson received 25 to 30 compositions a month for her consideration. Falls played these so Jackson could "catch the message of the song". Once selections were made, Falls and Jackson memorized each composition though while touring with Jackson, Falls was required to improvise as Jackson never sang a song the same way twice, even from rehearsal to a performance hours or minutes later. Falls found it necessary to watch Jackson's mannerisms and mouth instead of looking at the piano keys to keep up with her. At the beginning of a song, Falls might start in one key and receive hand signals from Jackson to change until Jackson felt the right key for the song in that moment. Falls remembered, "Mahalia waited until she heard exactly what was in her ear, and once she heard it, she went on about her business and she'd tear the house down."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Studs Terkel compared Falls to Paul Ulanowsky and Gerald Moore who played for classical singing stars Lotte Lehmann and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, respectively. Ralph Ellison called Falls and Jackson "the dynamic duo", saying that their performance at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival created "a rhythmical drive such as is expected of the entire Basie band. It is all joy and exultation and swing, but it is nonetheless religious music." Falls' right hand playing, according to Ellison, substituted for the horns in an orchestra which was in constant "conversation" with Jackson's vocals. Her left hand provided a "walking bass line that gave the music its 'bounce'", common in stride and ragtime playing. Similarly, television host Dinah Shore called Falls' left hand "the strongest thing in the whole world", giving Jackson's music a prominent beat usually missing from religious music. When Shore's studio musicians attempted to pinpoint the cause of Jackson's rousing sound, Shore admonished them with humor, saying, "Mildred's got a left hand, that's what your problem is." Anthony Heilbut explained, "By Chicago choir standards her chordings and tempos were old-fashioned, but they always induced a subtle rock exactly suited to Mahalia's swing."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's influence was greatest in black gospel music. Beginning in the 1930s, Sallie Martin, Roberta Martin, Willie Mae Ford Smith, Artelia Hutchins, and Jackson spread the gospel blues style by performing in churches around the U.S. For 15 years the genre developed in relative isolation with choirs and soloists performing in a circuit of churches, revivals, and National Baptist Convention (NBC) meetings where music was shared and sold among musicians, songwriters, and ministers. The NBC boasted a membership of four million, a network that provided the source material that Jackson learned in her early years and from which she drew during her recording career.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Though Jackson was not the first gospel blues soloist to record, historian Robert Marovich identifies her success with "Move On Up a Little Higher" as the event that launched gospel music from a niche movement in Chicago churches to a genre that became commercially viable nationwide. The "Golden Age of Gospel", occurring between 1945 and 1965, presented dozens of gospel music acts on radio, records, and in concerts in secular venues. Jackson's success was recognized by the NBC when she was named its official soloist, and uniquely, she was bestowed universal respect in a field of very competitive and sometimes territorial musicians. Marovich explains that she "was the living embodiment of gospel music's ecumenism and was welcomed everywhere".


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: "The Cambridge Companion to Blues and Gospel Music" identifies Jackson and Sam Cooke, whose music career started when he joined the Soul Stirrers, as the most important figures in black gospel music in the 1950s. To the majority of new fans, however, "Mahalia was the vocal, physical, spiritual symbol of gospel music", according to Heilbut. Raymond Horricks writes, "People who hold different religious beliefs to her own, and even people who have no religious beliefs whatsoever, are impressed by and give their immediate attention to her singing. She has, almost singlehandedly, brought about a wide, and often non-religious interest in the gospel singing of the Negro." Because she was often asked by white jazz and blues fans to define what she sang, she became gospel's most prominent defender, saying, "Blues are the songs of despair. Gospel songs are the songs of hope. When you sing gospel you have a feeling there's a cure for what's wrong. When you're through with the blues you've got nothing to rest on."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: As gospel music became accessible to mainstream audiences, its stylistic elements became pervasive in popular music as a whole. Jackson, who enjoyed music of all kinds, noticed, attributing the emotional punch of rock and roll to Pentecostal singing. Her Decca records were the first to feature the sound of a Hammond organ, spawning many copycats and resulting in its use in popular music, especially those evoking a soulful sound, for decades after. The first R&B and rock and roll singers employed the same devices that Jackson and her cohorts in gospel singing used, including ecstatic melisma, shouting, moaning, clapping, and stomping. Heilbut writes, "With the exception of Chuck Berry and Fats Domino, there is scarcely a pioneer rock and roll singer who didn't owe his stuff to the great gospel lead singers." Specifically, Little Richard, Mavis Staples of the Staple Singers, Donna Summer, Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, Della Reese, and Aretha Franklin have all named Jackson as an inspiration. Jackson was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the Early influence category in 1997. Mavis Staples justified her inclusion at the ceremony, saying, "When she sang, you would just feel light as a feather. God, I couldn't get enough of her." Franklin, who studied Jackson since she was a child and sang "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" at her funeral, was placed at "Rolling Stone's" number one spot in their list of 100 Greatest Singers of All Time, compiled in 2010. Despite her influence, Jackson was mostly displeased that gospel music was being used for secular purposes, considering R&B and soul music to be perversions, exploiting the music to make money.


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Jackson's success had a profound effect on black American identity, particularly for those who did not assimilate comfortably into white society. Though she and gospel blues were denigrated by members of the black upper class into the 1950s, for middle and lower class black Americans her life was a rags to riches story in which she remained relentlessly positive and unapologetically at ease with herself and her mannerisms in the company of white people. In "Imitation of Life", her portrayal as a funeral singer embodied sorrow for the character Annie, a maid who dies from heartbreak. Scholar Johari Jabir writes that in this role, "Jackson conjures up the unspeakable fatigue and collective weariness of centuries of black women." Through her music, she promoted hope and celebrated resilience in the black American experience. Jackson was often compared to opera singer Marian Anderson, as they both toured Europe, included spirituals in their repertoires, and sang in similar settings. Jackson considered Anderson an inspiration, and earned an invitation to sing at Constitution Hall in 1960, 21 years after the Daughters of the American Revolution forbade Anderson from performing there in front of an integrated audience. But Jackson's preference for the musical influence, casual language, and intonation of black Americans was a sharp contrast to Anderson's refined manners and concentration on European music. In interviews, Jackson repeatedly credits aspects of black culture that played a significant part in the development of her style: remnants of slavery music she heard at churches, work songs from vendors on the streets of New Orleans, and blues and jazz bands. Her first national television appearance on Ed Sullivan's "Toast of the Town" in 1952 showed her singing authentic gospel blues, prompting a large parade in her honor in Dayton, Ohio, with 50,000 black attendees – more than the integrated audience that showed up for a Harry Truman campaign stop around the same time. Known for her excited shouts, Jackson once called out "Glory!" on her CBS television show, following quickly with, "Excuse me, CBS, I didn't know where I was." By retaining her dialect and singing style, she challenged a sense of shame among many middle and lower class black Americans for their disparaged speech patterns and accents. Evelyn Cunningham of the "Pittsburgh Courier" attended a Jackson concert in 1954, writing that she expected to be embarrassed by Jackson, but "when she sang, she made me choke up and feel wondrously proud of my people and my heritage. She made me drop my bonds and become really emancipated."


title: Mahalia Jackson

text: Malcolm X noted that Jackson was "the first Negro that Negroes made famous". White radio host Studs Terkel was surprised to learn Jackson had a large black following before he found her records, saying, "For a stupid moment, I had thought that "I" discovered Mahalia Jackson." Jazz composer Duke Ellington, counting himself as a fan of Jackson's since 1952, asked her to appear on his album "Black, Brown and Beige" (1958), an homage to black American life and culture. Due to her decision to sing gospel exclusively she initially rejected the idea, but relented when Ellington asked her to improvise the 23rd Psalm. She was featured on the album's vocal rendition of Ellington's composition "Come Sunday", which subsequently became a jazz standard. As she became more famous, spending time in concert halls, she continued to attend and perform in black churches, often for free, to connect with congregations and other gospel singers. Believing that black wealth and capital should be reinvested into black people, Jackson designed her line of chicken restaurants to be black-owned and operated. She organized a 1969 concert called A Salute to Black Women, the proceeds of which were given to her foundation providing college scholarships to black youth. Upon her death, singer Harry Belafonte called her "the most powerful black woman in the United States" and there was "not a single field hand, a single black worker, a single black intellectual who did not respond to her".


title: Cambrian

text: The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million years ago (mya) to the beginning of the Ordovician Period mya. Its subdivisions, and its base, are somewhat in flux. The period was established as "Cambrian series" by Adam Sedgwick, who named it after Cambria, the Latin name for 'Cymru' (Wales), where Britain's Cambrian rocks are best exposed. Sedgwick identified the layer as part of his task, along with Roderick Murchison, to subdivide the large "Transition Series", although the two geologists disagreed for a while on the appropriate categorization. The Cambrian is unique in its unusually high proportion of sedimentary deposits, sites of exceptional preservation where "soft" parts of organisms are preserved as well as their more resistant shells. As a result, our understanding of the Cambrian biology surpasses that of some later periods.


title: Cambrian

text: The Cambrian marked a profound change in life on Earth: prior to the Cambrian, the majority of living organisms on the whole were small, unicellular and simple (Ediacaran fauna being notable exceptions). Complex, multicellular organisms gradually became more common in the millions of years immediately preceding the Cambrian, but it was not until this period that mineralized – hence readily fossilized – organisms became common. The rapid diversification of lifeforms in the Cambrian, known as the Cambrian explosion, produced the first representatives of all modern animal phyla. Phylogenetic analysis has supported the view that before the Cambrian radiation, in the Cryogenian or Tonian, animals (metazoans) evolved monophyletically from a single common ancestor: flagellated colonial protists similar to modern choanoflagellates.


title: Cambrian

text: Although diverse life forms prospered in the oceans, the land is thought to have been comparatively barren – with nothing more complex than a microbial soil crust and a few molluscs and arthropods (albeit not terrestrial) that emerged to browse on the microbial biofilm. By the end of the Cambrian, myriapods, arachnids, and hexapods started adapting to the land, along with the first plants. Most of the continents were probably dry and rocky due to a lack of vegetation. Shallow seas flanked the margins of several continents created during the breakup of the supercontinent Pannotia. The seas were relatively warm, and polar ice was absent for much of the period.


title: Cambrian

text: The base of the Cambrian lies atop a complex assemblage of trace fossils known as the "Treptichnus pedum" assemblage.


title: Cambrian

text: The use of "Treptichnus pedum", a reference ichnofossil to mark the lower boundary of the Cambrian, is problematic because very similar trace fossils belonging to the Treptichnids group are found well below "T. pedum" in Namibia, Spain and Newfoundland, and possibly in the western USA. The stratigraphic range of "T. pedum" overlaps the range of the Ediacaran fossils in Namibia, and probably in Spain.


title: Cambrian

text: The Cambrian is divided into four epochs (series) and ten ages (stages). Currently only three series and six stages are named and have a GSSP (an internationally agreed-upon stratigraphic reference point).


title: Cambrian

text: Because the international stratigraphic subdivision is not yet complete, many local subdivisions are still widely used. In some of these subdivisions the Cambrian is divided into three epochs with locally differing names – the Early Cambrian (Caerfai or Waucoban, mya), Middle Cambrian (St Davids or Albertan, mya) and Late Cambrian ( mya; also known as Merioneth or Croixan).


title: Cambrian

text: Trilobite zones allow biostratigraphic correlation in the Cambrian. Rocks of these epochs are referred to as belonging to the Lower, Middle, or Upper Cambrian.


title: Cambrian

text: Each of the local series is divided into several stages. The Cambrian is divided into several regional faunal stages of which the Russian-Kazakhian system is most used in international parlance:


title: Cambrian

text: <nowiki>*</nowiki>Most Russian paleontologists define the lower boundary of the Cambrian at the base of the Tommotian Stage, characterized by diversification and global distribution of organisms with mineral skeletons and the appearance of the first Archaeocyath bioherms.


title: Cambrian

text: The International Commission on Stratigraphy lists the Cambrian Period as beginning at and ending at .


title: Cambrian

text: The lower boundary of the Cambrian was originally held to represent the first appearance of complex life, represented by trilobites. The recognition of small shelly fossils before the first trilobites, and Ediacara biota substantially earlier, led to calls for a more precisely defined base to the Cambrian Period.


title: Cambrian

text: Despite the long recognition of its distinction from younger Ordovician rocks and older Precambrian rocks, it was not until 1994 that the Cambrian system/period was internationally ratified. After decades of careful consideration, a continuous sedimentary sequence at Fortune Head, Newfoundland was settled upon as a formal base of the Cambrian Period, which was to be correlated worldwide by the earliest appearance of "Treptichnus pedum". Discovery of this fossil a few metres below the GSSP led to the refinement of this statement, and it is the "T. pedum" ichnofossil assemblage that is now formally used to correlate the base of the Cambrian.


title: Cambrian

text: This formal designation allowed radiometric dates to be obtained from samples across the globe that corresponded to the base of the Cambrian. Early dates of quickly gained favour, though the methods used to obtain this number are now considered to be unsuitable and inaccurate. A more precise date using modern radiometric dating yield a date of . The ash horizon in Oman from which this date was recovered corresponds to a marked fall in the abundance of carbon-13 that correlates to equivalent excursions elsewhere in the world, and to the disappearance of distinctive Ediacaran fossils ("Namacalathus", "Cloudina"). Nevertheless, there are arguments that the dated horizon in Oman does not correspond to the Ediacaran-Cambrian boundary, but represents a facies change from marine to evaporite-dominated strata – which would mean that dates from other sections, ranging from 544 or 542 Ma, are more suitable.


title: Cambrian

text: Plate reconstructions suggest a global supercontinent, Pannotia, was in the process of breaking up early in the Cambrian, with Laurentia (North America), Baltica, and Siberia having separated from the main supercontinent of Gondwana to form isolated land masses. Most continental land was clustered in the Southern Hemisphere at this time, but was drifting north. Large, high-velocity rotational movement of Gondwana appears to have occurred in the Early Cambrian.


title: Cambrian

text: With a lack of sea ice – the great glaciers of the Marinoan Snowball Earth were long melted – the sea level was high, which led to large areas of the continents being flooded in warm, shallow seas ideal for sea life. The sea levels fluctuated somewhat, suggesting there were "ice ages", associated with pulses of expansion and contraction of a south polar ice cap.


title: Cambrian

text: In Baltoscandia a Lower Cambrian transgression transformed large swathes of the Sub-Cambrian peneplain into an epicontinental sea.


title: Cambrian

text: The Earth was generally very warm during the early Cambrian; its climate was comparable to the hot greenhouse of the Late Cretaceous and Early Palaeogene, as evidenced by a maximum in continental weathering rates over the last 900 million years and the presence of tropical, lateritic palaeosols at high palaeolatitudes during this time. Nonetheless, glaciers likely existed during the earliest Cambrian at high and possibly even at middle palaeolatitudes, possibly due to the ancient continent of Gondwana covering the South Pole and cutting off polar ocean currents. However, other authors believe these very early, pretrilobitic glacial deposits may not even be of Cambrian age at all but instead date back to the Neoproterozoic, an era characterised by numerous severe icehouse periods. Although molecular clock estimates suggest terrestrial plants may have first emerged during the Middle or Late Cambrian, the consequent large-scale removal of the greenhouse gas CO from the atmosphere through sequestration did not begin until the Ordovician. It became even warmer towards the end of the period, and sea levels rose dramatically. This warming trend continued into the Early Ordovician, which was characterised by an extremely hot global climate.


title: Cambrian

text: The Cambrian flora was little different from the Ediacaran. The principal taxa were the marine macroalgae "Fuxianospira", "Sinocylindra", and "Marpolia". No calcareous macroalgae are known from the period.


title: Cambrian

text: No land plant (embryophyte) fossils are known from the Cambrian. However, biofilms and microbial mats were well developed on Cambrian tidal flats and beaches 500 mya., and microbes forming microbial Earth ecosystems, comparable with modern soil crust of desert regions, contributing to soil formation.


title: Cambrian

text: The Cambrian explosion was a period of rapid multicellular growth. Most animal life during the Cambrian was aquatic. Trilobites were once assumed to be the dominant life form at that time, but this has proven to be incorrect. Arthropods were by far the most dominant animals in the ocean, but trilobites were only a minor part of the total arthropod diversity. What made them so apparently abundant was their heavy armor reinforced by calcium carbonate (CaCO), which fossilized far more easily than the fragile chitinous exoskeletons of other arthropods, leaving numerous preserved remains.


title: Cambrian

text: The period marked a steep change in the diversity and composition of Earth's biosphere. The Ediacaran biota suffered a mass extinction at the start of the Cambrian Period, which corresponded with an increase in the abundance and complexity of burrowing behaviour. This behaviour had a profound and irreversible effect on the substrate which transformed the seabed ecosystems. Before the Cambrian, the sea floor was covered by microbial mats. By the end of the Cambrian, burrowing animals had destroyed the mats in many areas through bioturbation. As a consequence, many of those organisms that were dependent on the mats became extinct, while the other species adapted to the changed environment that now offered new ecological niches. Around the same time there was a seemingly rapid appearance of representatives of all the mineralized phyla, including the Bryozoa, which were once thought to have only appeared in the Lower Ordovician. However, many of those phyla were represented only by stem-group forms; and since mineralized phyla generally have a benthic origin, they may not be a good proxy for (more abundant) non-mineralized phyla.


title: Cambrian

text: While the early Cambrian showed such diversification that it has been named the Cambrian Explosion, this changed later in the period, when there occurred a sharp drop in biodiversity. About 515 million years ago, the number of species going extinct exceeded the number of new species appearing. Five million years later, the number of genera had dropped from an earlier peak of about 600 to just 450. Also, the speciation rate in many groups was reduced to between a fifth and a third of previous levels. 500 million years ago, oxygen levels fell dramatically in the oceans, leading to hypoxia, while the level of poisonous hydrogen sulfide simultaneously increased, causing another extinction. The later half of Cambrian was surprisingly barren and showed evidence of several rapid extinction events; the stromatolites which had been replaced by reef building sponges known as Archaeocyatha, returned once more as the archaeocyathids became extinct. This declining trend did not change until the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event.


title: Cambrian

text: Some Cambrian organisms ventured onto land, producing the trace fossils "Protichnites" and "Climactichnites". Fossil evidence suggests that euthycarcinoids, an extinct group of arthropods, produced at least some of the "Protichnites". Fossils of the track-maker of "Climactichnites" have not been found; however, fossil trackways and resting traces suggest a large, slug-like mollusc.


title: Cambrian

text: In contrast to later periods, the Cambrian fauna was somewhat restricted; free-floating organisms were rare, with the majority living on or close to the sea floor; and mineralizing animals were rarer than in future periods, in part due to the unfavourable ocean chemistry.


title: Cambrian

text: Many modes of preservation are unique to the Cambrian, and some preserve soft body parts, resulting in an abundance of . These include Sirius Passet, the Sinsk Algal Lens, the Maotianshan Shales, the Emu Bay Shale, and the Burgess Shale.


title: Cambrian

text: The United States Federal Geographic Data Committee uses a "barred capital C" character to represent the Cambrian Period.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: INS "Vikramaditya" (Sanskrit: "", ) is a modified and the flagship of the Indian Navy. She entered into service in 2013.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: Originally built as "Baku" and commissioned in 1987, the carrier served with the Soviet Navy and later with the Russian Navy (as "Admiral Gorshkov") before being decommissioned in 1996. The carrier was invested by India on 20 January 2004 after years of negotiations at a final arms sales price of $2.35 billion. The transformed ship completed her sea trials in July 2013 and first STOBAR aviation trials in September 2013.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: She was commissioned on 16 November 2013 at a ceremony held at Severodvinsk, Russia. On 14 June 2014, the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Damodar Modi, formally inducted INS "Vikramaditya" into the Indian Navy and dedicated her to the nation.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: "Baku" entered service in 1987, renamed "Admiral Gorshkov" in 1991, but was deactivated in 1996 because she was too expensive to operate on a post-Cold War budget. This attracted the attention of India, which was looking for a way to expand its carrier aviation capabilities. On 20 January 2004, after years of negotiations, Russia and India signed a deal for the sale of the ship. The ship would be free, while India would pay US$800 million for the upgrade and refit of the vessel and an additional US$1 billion for the aircraft and weapons systems. The navy looked at equipping the carrier with the E-2C Hawkeye but decided not to. In 2009, Northrop Grumman offered the advanced E-2D Hawkeye to the Indian Navy.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The deal also included the purchase of 12 single-seat Mikoyan MiG-29K 'Fulcrum-D' (Product 9.41) and four dual-seat MiG-29KUB aircraft (with an option for 14 more aircraft) at US$1 billion, six Kamov Ka-31 "Helix" reconnaissance and anti-submarine helicopters, torpedo tubes, missile systems and artillery units. Facilities and procedures for training pilots and technical staff, delivery of simulators, spare parts, and establishment maintenance on Indian Navy facilities were also part of the contract.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The upgrade involved stripping all the weaponry and missile launcher tubes from the ship's foredeck to make way for a "short take-off but arrested recovery" (STOBAR) configuration, converting the "Gorshkov" from a hybrid carrier/cruiser to a pure carrier.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The announced delivery date for INS "Vikramaditya" was August 2008, allowing the carrier to enter service just as the Indian Navy's only light carrier INS "Viraat" retired. While "Viraat"'s retirement had been pushed out to 2010–2012, she underwent a final refit, enabling her to serve through 2016.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The delay issues were compounded by ongoing cost overruns, leading to high-level diplomatic exchanges. India finally agreed to pay an additional US$1.2 billion for the project, doubling the original cost. However, ongoing difficulty with "Vikramaditya's" delivery schedule pushed the expected delivery to 2013. Also, the indigenous "Vikrant"-class aircraft carrier was delayed by at least a year and was expected to be commissioned in 2013 from the proposed 2012.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: In July 2008, it was reported that Russia needed to increase the price by about US$2 billion, blaming unexpected cost overruns on the deteriorated condition of the ship and citing a "market price" for a new mid-size carrier of US$3–4 bn. India had paid US$400 million as of November 2008. However, Russia threatened to cancel the deal entirely if India did not pay the increased amount. In December 2008, government sources in India stated that the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) had finally decided in favour of purchasing "Admiral Gorshkov" as the best option available. The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) criticised the fact that "Vikramaditya" would be a second-hand warship with a limited lifespan, which would be 60% costlier than a new one. Also, there was a risk of further delay in its delivery.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The Indian Navy Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sureesh Mehta, defended the price for the warship, saying, "I can't comment on the CAG. But you all are defence analysts, can you get me an aircraft carrier for less than USD 2 billion? If you can, I am going to sign a cheque right now".


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The statement from the Chief of Naval Staff at that time indicated that the final deal could be over US$2 billion. When asked about CAG's finding that the navy had not done its risk analysis before going in for the ship, he was quoted as saying, "I can ensure you that there is no such thing. There is no question, we have been looking at the ship since the late 90s."


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 2 July 2009, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said that the refit of the carrier should be completed as soon as possible so she could be delivered to India in 2012. On 7 December 2009, Russian sources indicated that final terms had been agreed on, but no delivery date was set. On 8 December 2009, it was reported that India and Russia ended the stalemate over "Admiral Gorshkov" price deal by agreeing on a price of US$2.2 billion. Moscow asked for US$2.9 billion for the aircraft carrier, nearly three times that was originally agreed between the two sides in 2004. On the other hand, New Delhi wanted the price to be scaled back to US$2.1 billion. Both governments finalised the price of "Admiral Gorshkov" at US$2.35 billion on 10 March, a day ahead of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's two-day visit to India.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: In April 2010, a scandal over the project emerged when it was announced that a senior Indian Navy officer had probably been blackmailed in order to influence the negotiations over the cost of "Admiral Gorshkov" to India. Commodore Sukhjinder Singh had been a senior figure supervising the refit of the carrier, working as the principal director for the project. He was discharged from service due to this incident.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The hull work was completed by 2008, and "Vikramaditya" was launched on 4 December 2008. Around 99% of the structural work and almost 50% of the cabling work had been completed by June 2010. Nearly all of the large equipment, including engines and diesel generators, was installed. A naval MiG-29K prototype aircraft was used to test the deck systems of "Vikramaditya" in 2010.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: All reconfiguration work was completed at Severodvinsk, Russia. However, it was delayed by three years due to an underestimation of the amount of cabling needed. An expert-level discussion on technical and financial matters was held between India and Russia to resolve the issues. The MiG-29K entered operational service with India in February 2010. A compromise was finalised, and India was to pay an extra undisclosed amount. Russia was to install new systems instead of repairing the old ones.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 1 June 2010, "The Times of India" reported a naval officer saying: "With India earlier this year agreeing to the revised refit cost of $2.33 billion for "Gorshkov" after three years of bitter wrangling since the earlier agreement inked in January 2004 had earmarked only $974 million for it, Russia has appointed a high-level apex committee to oversee the work on the carrier". The ship was to go for harbour trials by early 2011 to ensure she could be handed over to India by around December 2012. Dock trials began on 1 March 2011. These trials focused on the main power generation units and the radio-electronic armament systems, manufactured in India. Indian Navy personnel began training on "Vikramaditya" in April 2011. On 19 April 2012, it was announced that all internal systems were functioning, and the ship was entirely self-contained. The ship's magnetic field and centre of gravity were measured before sea trials began.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: As completed, "Vikramaditya" has a larger full load displacement than when the ship was originally launched in 1982 as "Baku". 1,750 out of 2,500 compartments of the vessel were re-fabricated, and extensive re-cabling was done to support new radars and sensors. The elevators were upgraded, and two restraining stands were fitted, allowing combat aircraft to reach full power before making a ski jump-assisted short take-off. Three arresting gears were fitted on the aft of the angled deck, and navigation and carrier-landing aids were added to support fixed-wing "short take-off but arrested recovery" (STOBAR) operations.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The major modifications were to allow "Admiral Gorshkov" to operate as a STOBAR aircraft carrier in Indian service, as opposed to the STOVL configuration the ship was built as. This involved removal of all the armament, including the P-500 "Bazalt" cruise missile launchers and the four Antey Kinzhal surface-to-air missile bins fitted on the ship's bow, to make way for a 14.3°, full-width ski-jump. The 20-ton capacity aircraft lift beside the ship's island superstructure was unchanged, but the aft lift was enlarged, and its lift capacity increased to 30 tons. For STOBAR operations, three 30 m arrestor wires and three restraining gears on the stern of the angled deck were equipped. Sponsons were installed to increase flight deck area, allow the ski-jump to be fitted, for strengthening of arresting gear and runway area, and to lengthen the after end, which allowed an increase to the length of the landing strip aft of the arresting gear. 234 new hull sections were installed to achieve the desired shape, and the total steel added to carry out these modifications amounted to 2500 tons.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The superstructure profile was designed to accommodate the fixed phased array scanners of the Soviet Navy's Mars-Passat 3D air search radar system, along with extensive command and control facilities to conduct an aerial campaign. Extensive revamp of sensors was carried out, with long-range air-surveillance radars and advanced electronic warfare suites fitted, which enable the maintenance of a surveillance bubble of over 500 km around the ship. An aft mast was installed to accommodate various communication antennae. These changes needed 2,300 km of new cables and 3,000 km of new pipes.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The eight original boilers were replaced by new generation, high-pressure boilers, converted to take diesel fuel utilising LSHSD instead of furnace fuel oil, each providing a steam capacity of 100 tonnes per hour. The new boilers are highly efficient and have high levels of automation. They power four propellers in a four-shaft configuration, producing a total thrust of at the shaft, providing a top speed of over 30 knots. Six turbo alternators and six diesel alternators generate 18 MW of electricity to power various equipment. Modern oil-water separators, as well as a sewage treatment plant, were incorporated to meet international standards. Six new Finnish Wärtsilä 1.5 MW diesel generators, a Global Marine communications system, Sperry Bridgemaster navigation radar, a new telephone exchange, new data link and an IFF Mk XI system were added. Residential services were improved with the addition of two reverse osmosis plants producing 400 tons of fresh water per day, as well as updated refrigeration and air conditioning. A new galley was installed with improved domestic services and accommodation for 10 female officers.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The combat systems on board the carrier are controlled by LESORUB-E, the computer-aided action information system. It gathers data from the ship's sensors and data links and creates comprehensive situational awareness. The CCS Mk II communication complex is installed for external communications and the Link II tactical data system enables integration into the Indian Navy's network-centric operations. Modern launch and recovery systems are installed for handling different aircraft – the LUNA landing system for MiG-29Ks and the DAPS Landing system for Sea Harriers. The Resistor-E automated air-traffic control system has been installed, which assists with approach, landing and short-range navigation down to a distance of 30 metres short of the flight deck to the pilots. Along with various other sub-systems, it provides navigation and flight data to ship-borne aircraft operating at long distances from the carrier.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: When delivered, "Vikramaditya" had yet to be fitted with any onboard armament, leaving her dependent on her battle group for self-defence. This was rectified during the ship's short refit of April–June 2015, when she was fitted with four license-built AK-630 CIWS and a Barak 1 SAM system stripped from the decommissioned . During the ship's first scheduled major refit in 2017, the Barak 1 system will be replaced with the newly developed Barak 8 long-range air-defence system (LR-SAM), which is currently being tested. It is launched from vertical launch cells and has an operational range of 0.5–100 km. The carrier will carry up to 48 missiles.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The official expected life span of the ship is 40 years, and she is unlikely to require any major repair work for at least a decade. Over 70% of the vessel and her equipment is new, and the remainder has been refurbished. Sevmash Shipyard, which upgraded the carrier, will provide warranty servicing, including maintenance for the next 20 years.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: "Vikramaditya" has been designed as a STOBAR carrier capable of operating both conventional fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters, with up to 34 aircraft capable of being accommodated. Its primary embarked aircraft type is the Mikoyan MiG-29K, a navalised version of the Mikoyan MiG-29M. The MiG-29K is an advanced, all-weather multi-role fighter capable of undertaking both the fleet air defence, low-level strike and anti-shipping roles. The primary ASW platform is the venerable Westland Sea King, while the Kamov Ka-31 undertakes AEW. Carriage ranges given for the ship seem to converge around 16–24 MiG-29K and 10 Kamov Ka-31 or Dhruv helicopters; however, "Vikramaditya" cannot operate fixed-wing AEW aircraft owing to her configuration as a STOBAR carrier. Utility and plane guard duties are undertaken by the HAL Chetak (or HAL Dhruv).


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: Russia was scheduled to hand over "Vikramaditya" to India on 4 December 2012, with sea trials scheduled to begin on 29 May 2012. The sea trials began on 8 June. The ship sailed out for pre-delivery trials from the berth of the Sevmash shipyard in Russia's northern city of Severodvinsk. These trials were to include landing and take-off of fighter jets from the deck of the carrier.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 17 September 2012, malfunctions were detected during trials. According to an official report, seven out of eight steam boilers of the propulsion machinery were out of order. Due to this, the deadline to hand over this ship to the Indian Navy was postponed again until October 2013. Later investigation has determined that the cause of the engine failure was poor workmanship and supervision. The "Gorshkov" and other ships of the 1143.4 class had a history of multiple boiler failures; however, Russian shipbuilders claimed that the problem was the low-grade Chinese-made fire bricks bought by the Indian Navy that were used in the boiler insulation instead of asbestos.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 3 July 2013, Igor Sevastyanov, deputy head of Russia's state arms exporter Rosoboronexport, announced that the warship had departed for sea trials with a mix of Russian and Indian crew. On 28 July 2013, it was reported that "Vikramaditya" had successfully completed her sea trials and was able to reach her maximum speed of 32 knots. She then proceeded to the White Sea for aviation trials, carried out by Russia's Northern Fleet aviation and completed in September 2013. Aircraft and helicopters flew around and over the ship to check the performance of its radar, air defence, communication and control systems, and MiG specialists praised the ski-jump ramp.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The sea trials lasted three months. The carrier's electronic warfare and jamming capability was demonstrated when Sukhoi-33s, Kamovs, MiG-29s and A-50 early warning aircraft failed to "paint" the carrier using their radars, whereas the incoming aircraft were detected by the ship at a distance of . In total, the ship sailed for during both trials, controlled 778 aircraft and helicopter flights, and conducted 88 landings by Russian pilots. During the second sea trial, she sailed for , of which were under the command of the ship's Indian captain Commodore Suraj Berry.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: During sea trials, a Lockheed P-3 Orion patrol aircraft observed "Vikramaditya". While in international waters, it flew close to the ship to take photographs and dropped sonobuoys to record the ship's acoustic signature. The aircraft left the area when a Russian MiG-29 fighter arrived. A Norwegian ship was also seen to observe "Vikramaditya".


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The ship was formally commissioned on 16 November 2013 at a ceremony held at Severodvinsk, Russia. The ceremony was attended by the then-Indian defence minister A. K. Antony and the Russian deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin. The ship is now patrolling the Indian Ocean.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: After commissioning, the carrier began a continuous 26-day journey of 10,212 nautical miles to its homeport at , Karwar, from Severodvinsk on 27 November 2013, with a short stopover in Lisbon. She was under the command of Commodore Suraj Berry, her first Indian captain. Apart from her Indian crew, she also carried 177 Russian specialists from Sevmash, who would remain on board for one year, as part of the 20-year post-warranty services contract with the shipyard. During the journey, she encountered a storm in the Barents Sea, where she linked up with her escorts frigate and fleet tanker . The group was escorted by the Royal Navy frigate while passing through the English Channel and was joined by destroyer near Gibraltar.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: The flotilla sailed in the Mediterranean Sea, passed through the Suez Canal and entered the Arabian Sea near the Gulf of Aden on 1 January 2014. She was received nearly away from Indian shores by a large flotilla of the Western fleet. It was composed of the aircraft carrier , two s, three s, the frigate , and a couple of offshore patrol vessels, including . The event was significant as the Indian Navy operated two aircraft carriers simultaneously for the first time in 20 years. After conducting basic sea exercises with the fleet, "Vikramaditya" reached Karwar on 7 January 2014.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: Navy pilots of INAS 303 "Black Panthers" operating the MiG-29K practised carrier operations at the shore-based test facility (SBTF) in INS Hansa, Dabolim, Vasco-da-Gama. The first aircraft piloted by an Indian Navy pilot landed on the carrier on 8 February 2014. Since then, the pilots and air controllers have been certified to operate the MiG-29K fighters from the carrier deck, including night landings. The carrier's air wing will consist of 16 MiG-29Ks, including four KUB trainers, six airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) Kamov Ka-31 and Kamov Ka-28 anti-submarine warfare (ASW) helicopters.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: In May 2014, the carrier was declared operationally deployed along with its embarked air group comprising MiG-29Ks and had taken part in a war game conducted by the Western Naval Command. On 14 June 2014, the Prime Minister of India dedicated the carrier to the country.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 8 December 2015, Indian Defence-Ministry sources stated that the INS "Vikramaditya" would receive its first major overhaul in September 2016 as part of the "Make in India" initiative. The state-owned Cochin Shipyards and the Pipavav shipyards will overhaul the carrier once she is in dry dock.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 21–22 January 2016, "Vikramaditya", accompanied by , made her first overseas port visit when the ship visited Colombo in Sri Lanka, making the first visit of an Indian warship to the city in 30 years, and the first by an aircraft carrier in more than 40 years.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 15–18 February 2016, "Vikramaditya" accompanied by two ships, INS "Mysore" and , made a goodwill visit to Male, Maldives.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: In September 2016, "Vikramaditya" was dry-docked in Kochi for a month-long refit by Cochin Shipyards; the refit was completed in November, a month ahead of schedule.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: A State Bank of India ATM was opened onboard "Vikramaditya" on 21 January 2017, making her the first Indian Navy ship to have an ATM.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: In January 2020, "Vikramaditya" was used to undertake the first carrier trials of the naval version of the HAL Tejas Light Combat Aircraft. Over eight to ten days, the Tejas was launched and recovered several times as part of the aircraft's initial test phase. The Tejas was the first indigenous Indian aircraft to both land on and take off from an Indian aircraft carrier.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 10 June 2016, while undergoing a scheduled major refit of INS "Vikramaditya", two people were killed by a toxic gas leak that occurred during maintenance work in the Sewage Treatment Plant compartment of INS "Vikramaditya" at Karwar. Two other people were injured and taken to the naval hospital.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 28 February 2017, a MiG-29K aircraft that took off from "Vikramaditya" had to make an emergency landing at Mangalore International Airport due to hydraulic failure.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 26 April 2019, one naval officer died of smoke inhalation at Karwar's naval hospital INHS Patanjali, and seven others were injured after fighting a fire that erupted in the boiler room of "Vikramaditya" on her course to INS Kadamba.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: A MiG 29KUB disembarking from INS Vikramaditya enroute to INS Hansa crashed in the sea on 26 November 2020, resulting in the death of a pilot, Commander Nishant Singh.


title: INS Vikramaditya

text: On 20 July 2022, a fire broke out during a planned sortie for conducting sea trials off Karwar in the Uttar Kannada district of Karnataka. No casualties were reported.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: The Secret of NIMH is a 1982 American animated fantasy adventure film directed by Don Bluth in his directorial debut and based on Robert C. O'Brien's 1971 children's novel, "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH". The film features the voices of Elizabeth Hartman, Peter Strauss, Arthur Malet, Dom DeLuise, John Carradine, Derek Jacobi, Hermione Baddeley, and Paul Shenar. It was produced by Bluth's production company Don Bluth Productions in association with Aurora Productions.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: "The Secret of NIMH" was released in the United States on July 16, 1982, by MGM/UA Entertainment Co. under the United Artists label. It was followed in 1998 by a direct-to-video sequel, "", which was made without Bluth's involvement or input and met with poor reception. In 2015, a live-action/computer-animated remake was reported to be in the works. A television series adaptation is also in development by the Fox Corporation.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: Mrs. Brisby, a widowed field mouse, lives in a cinder block with her children on the Fitzgibbons' farm. Brisby longs to move her family out of the field as plowing time approaches but her son Timothy has fallen ill.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: Brisby visits Mr. Ages, a friend of her late husband, Jonathan. Ages diagnoses the illness as pneumonia, provides Brisby with medicine, and warns her that Timothy must stay inside for at least three weeks or he could die. On her way home, Brisby befriends Jeremy, a clumsy but friendly crow. They both narrowly escape from the Fitzgibbons' cat, Dragon. The next morning, Brisby discovers that Farmer Fitzgibbons has started plowing early. Although her neighbor Auntie Shrew helps her disable his tractor, Brisby knows she must devise another plan. Jeremy takes her to meet the Great Owl, who tells her to visit a colony of rats that live beneath a rose bush on the farm and ask for the services of Nicodemus, their wise and mystical leader.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: Brisby enters the rose bush and encounters an aggressive guard rat named Brutus, who chases her away. She is led back in by Ages, and is amazed to see the rats' use of electricity and other technology. Brisby meets Justin, the friendly captain of the guard; Jenner, a ruthless and power-hungry rat opposed to Nicodemus; and finally Nicodemus himself. From Nicodemus, she learns that many years ago the rats, along with her husband and Ages, were part of a series of experiments at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH for short). The experiments boosted their intelligence, enabling them to escape, as well as extending their lifespans and slowing their aging processes. However, they are unable to live as typical rats would, and need human technology to survive, which they have accomplished only by stealing. Nicodemus has authorized a plan for the rats to leave the farm and live independently in an area they refer to as Thorn Valley.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: Nicodemus gives Brisby a magical amulet that will activate when the wearer is courageous. Because of the rats' relationship with Jonathan, they agree to help her move her home. First, they need to drug Dragon so that it can be done safely. Only Brisby can do this, as the rats cannot fit through the hole leading into the house; Jonathan was killed by Dragon in a previous attempt, while Ages broke his leg in another. That night, she puts the drug into Dragon's dish, but the Fitzgibbons' son, Billy, catches her. While trapped in a birdcage, she overhears a telephone conversation between Farmer Fitzgibbons and the staff of NIMH and learns that the institute intends to exterminate the rats in the morning. Brisby then escapes from the cage and runs off to warn them.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: As a rainstorm approaches, the rats begin moving the Brisby home, with the children and Auntie Shrew inside, using a rope and pulley system. Jenner, who wishes for the rats to remain in the rose bush, sabotages the assembly with his reluctant accomplice Sullivan, causing it to fall apart and crush Nicodemus to death. Brisby soon arrives to warn the rats about NIMH's arrival, but Jenner attacks her and attempts to steal the amulet. Sullivan alerts Justin, who comes to Brisby's aid. Jenner mortally wounds Sullivan but is injured by Justin in a sword fight. As Jenner attempts to attack Justin from behind, the dying Sullivan throws a dagger into his back, killing him. The Brisby home begins to sink into a mud puddle and Brisby and the rats are unable to raise it. Brisby's will to save her family gives power to the amulet, which she uses to lift the house and move it to safety. The next morning, the rats, with Justin as their new leader, have departed for Thorn Valley as Timothy begins to recover. Jeremy soon meets Miss Right, another crow who is just as clumsy as he is, and they fall in love.


title: The Secret of NIMH

text: The film rights to the book "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH" had reportedly been offered to Walt Disney Productions in 1972, but they were turned down.