title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Guaraldi married high school girlfriend Shirley Moskowitz on February 1, 1953. She initially filed for divorce on April 21, 1966, citing "extreme cruelty", which was eventually withdrawn. Moskowitz filed a second time in June 1968, which took effect on December 8, 1970. The union produced two children: David Anthony Guaraldi (b. August 11, 1955) and Dia Lisa (b. February 16, 1960). Guaraldi also had a long-term affair with Gretchen Katamay, with whom he appeared on the cover of his 1964 album, "The Latin Side of Vince Guaraldi".


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: A book-length biography of Guaraldi was published in March 2012. "Vince Guaraldi at the Piano", by author and Guaraldi archivist Derrick Bang, chronicles Guaraldi's career and role in the Northern California jazz scene, and also includes a complete discography and filmography, as well as an appendix of quotations from Guaraldi's former sidemen.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Jazz musician David Benoit has often credited Guaraldi and the "Charlie Brown Christmas" soundtrack for his interest in jazz. In 1985, Benoit recorded a cover of Guaraldi's "Linus and Lucy" for an album called "This Side Up", which enjoyed considerable radio airplay and helped launch the smooth jazz genre. He released "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" on the album "Waiting for Spring" in 1989.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: New Age pianist George Winston released a Guaraldi tribute album in 1996 titled "". Winston performed many "Peanuts" songs that had not been released by Guaraldi. "I love his melodies and his chord progressions", Winston said of Guaraldi. "He has a really personal way of doing voicings. His music is part of our culture and we know it even if we don’t know Vince. He had three bags: the Latin, the "Peanuts", and the impressionistic 'Cast Your Fate to the Wind' stuff. And those three bags are all his." The album was very successful, leading Winston to record a follow-up, titled "", released in early 2010. A third volume, entitled "Count the Ways: The Music of Vince Guaraldi, Volume 3," is slated for a future release.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Mendelson reflected on Guaraldi's contribution to the "Peanuts" franchise when Winston released his two tribute albums, saying "Several generations have now grown up with Vince Guaraldi's music. If people hear just one or two bass notes of the intro to 'Linus and Lucy', they cheer. The "Peanuts" programs and Vince's music were such a wonderful marriage. It's a shame it got cut off so soon, but people like George are perpetuating it, for which we are very appreciative."


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: In 2003, Guaraldi's son David began working to secure the necessary licenses to distribute some of his father's previously unreleased material. The first release, "The Charlie Brown Suite & Other Favorites", featured an archived 1969 live performance of the seven-part "Charlie Brown Suite". Other releases include "Oaxaca" (2004), "North Beach" (2006), "Vince Guaraldi and the Lost Cues from the Charlie Brown Television Specials", Volumes 1 (2007) and 2 (2008), "Live on the Air" (2008) and "An Afternoon with the Vince Guaraldi Quartet" (2011).


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: In 2010, a two-hour documentary entitled "The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi" was screened at a variety of jazz and film festivals. The documentary highlighted newly discovered and restored footage of Guaraldi's appearances and recording sessions and featured new performances and insights from Winston, Dave Brubeck, Dick Gregory, Jon Hendricks, Leonard Maltin, Paul Krassner and surviving Guaraldi sidemen Eddie Duran, Dean Reilly, and Jerry Granelli. The documentary was co-produced by Toby Gleason (son of Ralph J. Gleason) and filmmaker Andrew Thomas. "The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi" was the recipient of five "Best Documentary" awards, and was a special presentation at the Library of Congress and Monterey Jazz Festival. Gleason commented, "let's just agree that Vince Guaraldi re-invented the sound of the modern American Christmas."


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: In the original liner notes for "Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown", Ralph J. Gleason praised Guaraldi's "Peanuts" contributions, noting, "The hardest task an artist faces is not just to achieve self-expression; that almost comes by definition, even if it's difficult to hone that self-expression into something good enough to be art." Gleason continued: "It is another kind of thing altogether to look at, hear, feel and experience somebody else's artistic expression and then make something of your own which shows empathy, which relates to the other but which still has your own individual artistic stamp. That is what Vince Guaraldi achieved with his scores for Charlie Brown. He took his inspiration from the creations of Charles Schulz and made music that reflects that inspiration, is empathetic with the image and is still solidly and unmistakably Vince Guaraldi."


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: In his review of "The Definitive Vince Guaraldi" (2009), "All About Jazz" critic David Rickert credited Guaraldi for introducing many to the world of jazz music "before we even knew what it was. [Guaraldi]'s soundtracks for the "Peanuts" television specials were a novel idea in cartoon scoring, yet seemed to perfectly fit the deceptively sophisticated adventures of Charlie Brown and the rest of the "Peanuts" gang. His originals were some of the best jazz to come from the West Coast scene and a tribute to what can happen when a great muse hits a gifted composer."


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Guaraldi used a variety of sidemen throughout his career. His main preference was playing as a trio, although this number would increase depending on the needs of a song, live performance or "Peanuts" soundtrack. The largest confluence of musicians occurred in 1969 for soundtrack recordings of "It Was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown" (octet) and "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" (nonet).


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: For bass/double bass, regular sidemen during the 1950s and 1960s included Monty Budwig, Dean Reilly, Fred Marshall and Tom Beeson. During the 1970s, Guaraldi performed with Koji Kataoka and primarily Seward McCain.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Guitarist Eddie Duran served steadily throughout the 1950s and 1960s, save for mid-1963–65 when Guaraldi teamed up with guitarist Bola Sete as a double act. During the 1970s, Guaraldi himself performed guitar when necessary but otherwise did not retain a sideman to fill the position.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: Guaraldi's first two releases—"Vince Guaraldi Trio" (1956) and "A Flower Is a Lovesome Thing" (1957)—did not feature a drummer. Starting in 1961, Colin Bailey filled the role, followed by Jerry Granelli. Mike Clark became Guaraldi's regular drummer for live performances during the 1970s. Other drummers included Lee Charlton, John Rae, Al Coster, Eliot Zigmund, Glenn Cronkhite, Vince Lateano, Mark Rosengarden, and Jim Zimmerman.


title: Vince Guaraldi

text: The original Vince Guaraldi Trio consisted of Dean Reilly (bass) and Eddie Duran (guitar), appearing on Guaraldi's first two albums. The second lineup, considered the first of two "classic" trios, featured Monty Budwig (bass) and Colin Bailey (drums). This version of the classic trio appeared on "Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus" and "Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown". The second of two classic trios featured Fred Marshall (bass) and Jerry Granelli (drums). This incarnation was featured on more albums than any other trio, including "Vince Guaraldi, Bola Sete and Friends", "", "The Latin Side of Vince Guaraldi", "From All Sides" and "A Charlie Brown Christmas".


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Tariq Aziz ( , 28 April 1936 – 5 June 2015) was an Iraqi politician who served as Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs and a close advisor of President Saddam Hussein. Their association began in the 1950s when both were activists for the then-banned Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. He was both an Arab nationalist and a member of the Chaldean Catholic Church.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Because of security concerns, Saddam rarely left Iraq, so Aziz would often represent Iraq at high-level diplomatic summits. What the United States wanted, he averred, was not "regime change" in Iraq but rather "region change". He said that the Bush Administration's reasons for war were "oil and Israel."


title: Tariq Aziz

text: After surrendering to American forces on 24 April 2003, Aziz was held in prison, first by American forces and subsequently by the Iraqi government, in Camp Cropper in western Baghdad. He was acquitted of some charges on 1 March 2009 following a trial, but was sentenced to 15 years on 11 March 2009 for the executions of 42 merchants found guilty of profiteering in 1992 and another 7 years for relocating Kurds.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 26 October 2010, he was sentenced to death by the Iraqi High Tribunal, which sparked regional and international condemnation from Iraqi bishops and other Iraqis, the Vatican, the United Nations, the European Union and the human rights organization Amnesty International, as well as various governments around the world, such as Russia. On 28 October 2010, it was reported that Aziz, as well as 25 fellow prison inmates, had begun a hunger strike to protest the fact that they could not receive their once-monthly visit from friends and relatives, which was normally set for the last Friday of each month.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Iraqi President Jalal Talabani declared that he would not sign Aziz's execution order, thus commuting his sentence to indefinite imprisonment. Aziz remained in custody the rest of his life and died of a heart attack in the city of Nasiriyah on 5 June 2015, aged 79.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Mikhail Yuhanna ( ) was born on 28 April 1936, in Tel Keppe, northern Iraq, to a Christian Assyrian family. He studied English at Baghdad University and later worked as a journalist, before joining the Ba'ath Party in 1957. He changed his distinctly Christian name in Syriac to the more Arabic sounding Tariq Aziz to gain acceptance by the Arab and Muslim majority. In 1963, he was editor of the newspaper "Al-Jamahir" and "Al-Thawra", the newspaper of the Ba'ath party.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: He began to rise through the ranks of Iraqi politics after the Ba'ath party came to power in 1968. Aziz became close to Saddam Hussein who heavily promoted him. He served as a member of the Regional Command, the Ba'ath Party's highest governing organization from 1974 to 1977, and in 1977 became a member of Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: In 1979, Aziz became Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, and worked as a diplomat to explain Iraq's policies to the world. In April 1980 he survived an Iranian-backed assassination attempt carried out by members of the Islamic Dawa Party. In the attack, members of Islamic Dawa Party threw a grenade at Aziz in central Baghdad. The attack killed several people. This incident formed part of the "casus belli" of the Iran–Iraq War.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: When Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, Aziz served as the international spokesman in support of the military action. He claimed the invasion was justified because Kuwait's increased oil production was harming Iraqi oil revenues. He condemned Arab states for "subservience to the United States' hegemony in the Middle East and their support for punitive sanctions." On 9 January 1991, Aziz was involved in the Geneva Peace Conference which included the United States Secretary of State, James Baker. The goal of the meeting was to discuss a possible resolution to the occupation of Kuwait.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: In October 2000, the then-junior Minister for Foreign Affairs from Britain, Peter Hain, set up a secret war avoidance team to carry messages back and forth between himself and Aziz. After initial cooperation, Aziz rebuffed the delegations.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 14 February 2003, Aziz reportedly had an audience with Pope John Paul II and other officials in Vatican City, where, according to a Vatican statement, he communicated "the wish of the Iraqi government to co-operate with the international community, notably on disarmament". The same statement said that the Pope "insisted on the necessity for Iraq to faithfully respect and give concrete commitments to resolutions of the United Nations Security Council, which is the guarantor of international law".


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Shortly after the invasion of Iraq, President George W. Bush claimed Aziz as one of the Iraqi regime who was responsible for hiding Iraqi WMD:


title: Tariq Aziz

text: He voluntarily surrendered to American forces on 24 April 2003, after negotiations had been mediated by his son. His chief concern at the time was for the welfare of his family. At the time of his surrender, Aziz was ranked number 43 out of 55 in the American list of most-wanted Iraqis despite a belief "he probably would not know answers to questions like where weapons of mass destruction may be hidden and where Saddam Hussein might be."


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Before the war, Aziz claimed he would rather die than be a U.S. prisoner of war: "Do you expect me, after all my history as a militant and as one of the Iraqi leaders, to go to an American prison – to go to Guantanamo? I would rather die", he told Britain's ITV.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 24 May 2006, Aziz testified in Baghdad as a defence witness for Ibrahim Barzan and Mukhabarat employees, claiming that they did not have any role in the 1982 Dujail crackdown. He stated that the arrests were in response to the assassination attempt on Saddam Hussein, which was carried out by the Shiite Dawa Party. "If the head of state comes under attack, the state is required by law to take action. If the suspects are caught with weapons, it's only natural they should be arrested and put on trial".


title: Tariq Aziz

text: He further testified that the Dujail attack was "part of a series of attacks and assassination attempts by this group, including against me." He said that in 1980, Dawa Party insurgents threw a grenade at him as he visited a Baghdad university, killing civilians around him. "I'm a victim of a criminal act conducted by this party, which is in power right now. So put it on trial. Its leader was the prime minister and his deputy is the prime minister right now and they killed innocent Iraqis in 1980," he said. The Dawa Party is now a party in the Shiite coalition that dominates the Iraqi government. The party's leader, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, was prime minister until mid-May, when another leading Dawa Party figure, Nouri al-Maliki, was picked and he was able to form a new government before the end of May 2006.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: In his closing remarks, he stated that "Saddam is my colleague and comrade for decades, and Barzan is my brother and my friend and he is not responsible for Dujail's events."


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 29 May 2005, the British newspaper "The Observer" published letters (in Arabic and English) from Aziz written in April and May 2005, while he was in American custody, addressed to "world public opinion" pleading for international help to end "his dire situation":


title: Tariq Aziz

text: In August 2005, Aziz's family was allowed to visit him. At the time the location of Aziz's prison was undisclosed; his family was transported in a bus with blackened out windows.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: For security reasons he was later moved to Camp Cropper, part of the huge US base surrounding Baghdad airport. His son said that while his father was in poor health, he was being well treated by prison officials. He could make 30 minutes of telephone calls monthly and had access to US Arabic-language radio and television stations. Every two months his family could send a parcel containing clothes, cigarettes, chocolate, coffee and magazines.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: The spiritual leader of Iraq's Chaldean Catholic community, Emmanuel III Delly, called for Aziz's release in his 2007 Christmas message. Aziz was acquitted of crimes against humanity.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 17 January 2010, Aziz suffered a stroke and was transferred from prison to hospital. On 5 August 2010, "The Guardian" released his first face-to-face interview since his surrender. On 22 September 2010, documents were released that he had given an interview about how he had told the FBI that the dictator Hussein was "delighted" in the 1998 terrorist bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa but had no interest in partnering with Osama bin Laden.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Aziz was set to appear before the Iraqi High Tribunal set up by the Iraq Interim Government, but was not brought up on any charges until April 2008. This changed when, on 29 April 2008, Aziz went on trial over the deaths of a group of 42 merchants who were executed by the Iraqi regime in 1992, after the merchants had been charged by the Iraqi regime with manipulating food prices when Iraq was under international sanctions.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: The charges brought against Aziz were reported by "The Independent" to be "surprising" as the deaths of the 42 merchants had always previously been attributed to Saddam Hussein. Nevertheless, on 11 March 2009 the Iraqi High Tribunal ruled that Aziz was guilty of crimes against humanity, and he was sentenced to 15 years in prison. On 2 August 2009, Aziz was convicted by the Iraqi High Tribunal of helping to plan the forced displacement of Kurds from northeastern Iraq and sentenced to seven years in jail. After these judgments had been passed, BBC News stated that "there was no evidence that a Western court would regard as compelling that he had anything like final responsibility for the carrying out of the executions" of the 42 merchants and "there was no real evidence of his personal involvement and guilt" with regards to the displacement of Kurds. That same year, he was acquitted in a separate trial which concerned the suppression of an uprising in Baghdad during the 1990s.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 26 October 2010, the Iraqi High Tribunal handed down a death sentence against Aziz for the offense of "persecution of Islamic parties," amongst them the serving Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Islamic Dawa Party, following a crackdown on a Shia uprising after the 1991 Gulf War. The Associated Press reports that "the judge gave no details of Aziz's specific role" in the crackdown. His lawyer stated that Aziz's role in the former Iraqi government was in the arena of "Iraq's diplomatic and political relations only, and had nothing to do with the executions and purges carried during Hussein's reign." His lawyer further stated that the death sentence itself was politically motivated and that timing of the death sentence may have been aimed at diverting international attention away from documents released by WikiLeaks, which detailed crimes in which Maliki government officials have been implicated. His lawyers had 30 days to lodge an appeal, following which the court would have another 30 days to look into the appeal; if the appeal is turned down the sentence would be carried out after another 30 days. On 26 October 2010 the Vatican urged the Iraqi government not to carry out his execution, and European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton stated that Aziz's execution would be "unacceptable and the EU will seek to commute his sentence." That same day, the human rights organization Amnesty International issued a statement condemning the use of the death penalty in this case, as well as for the cases of two other former Iraqi officials; the statement also expressed concern regarding the manner in which trials may have been conducted by the Iraqi High Tribunal. On 27 October 2010, Greek President Karolos Papoulias and the Russian Foreign Ministry both released statements urging the Iraqi government not to carry out the death penalty against Aziz. Also on 27 October 2010, a spokesperson for United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon was reported to have "stressed that the UN is against the death sentence and in this case, as in all others, it is calling for the verdict to be cancelled." On 28 October 2010, it was reported that some Iraqi Bishops and many ordinary Iraqis also condemned the death penalty for Aziz. Furthermore, according to "The Wall Street Journal", "several international human-rights groups have criticised the procedures and questioned the impartiality of the court."


title: Tariq Aziz

text: According to Agence France-Presse (AFP), his family stated that Aziz, along with 25 fellow inmates, had been on a hunger strike following the sentence to protest the denial of their once-monthly visits with family and friends, but an Iraqi court official has denied this. According to AFP, Aziz and the other prisoners were "still at the site of the court in Baghdad’s Green Zone and had not been transferred back to prison where they could have received their monthly visit."


title: Tariq Aziz

text: On 17 November 2010, it was reported that Iraqi President Jalal Talabani had declared that he would not sign Aziz's execution order. On 5 December 2011, Saad Yousif al-Muttalibi, an adviser to the Prime Minister, had claimed the execution of Aziz would "definitely take place" after the withdrawal of American forces.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: In 2001, his son Ziad was arrested for corruption. In January 1999, Ziad was accused by his former mistress of using the official position of his father (mostly his cars) to facilitate smooth crossing of the Jordanian border with contraband, attempted murder of her husband and family, as well as for corruption involving French and Indonesian companies. He was arrested and sentenced to 22 years in prison. Aziz resigned from his post but Saddam did not accept his resignation. Ziad was eventually released from prison when Saddam decided that Aziz had paid enough for his mistakes.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Ziad Aziz now lives in Jordan with his wife, four children, and Tariq Aziz's two sisters. Tariq Aziz's wife and another son live in Jordan.


title: Tariq Aziz

text: Tariq Aziz died on 5 June 2015 in al-Hussein hospital in the city of Nasiriyah, at the age of 79. According to his lawyer, he was being treated well in prison but suffered from ill health and simply wanted an end to his "misery". The incarcerated Aziz suffered from depression, diabetes, heart disease, and ulcers. Aziz's daughter, Zeinab, claimed his body was stolen at Baghdad International Airport en route to Jordan by unidentified men on 11 June, but it was recovered the day after. Jordanian authorities said the body had not been stolen, but merely delayed until the relevant paperwork was filled out. Aziz was buried in Madaba.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: God's Creatures is a 2022 psychological drama film directed by Saela Davis and Anna Rose Holmer and written by Shane Crowley, based on a story he wrote with producer Fodhla Cronin O'Reilly. It stars Emily Watson, Paul Mescal, Aisling Franciosi, Declan Conlon, Toni O'Rourke, Marion O'Dwyer, Brendan McCormack, and Lalor Roddy. The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on 19 May 2022 and was released in the United States on 30 September 2022 by A24.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: In a small remote Irish fishing village, Aileen (Watson) works as a shift manager at the local seafood processing plant alongside Marry (O’Dwyer), whose son Mark recently drowned at sea, and Sarah (Franciosi), a young woman experiencing marital troubles with her husband Francie (McCormack). At Mark's funeral reception, Aileen’s estranged son Brian (Mescal) unexpectedly returns after a lengthy and unexplained move to Australia. While initially caught off-guard, Aileen is delighted to reunite her family together alongside husband Con (Conlon), daughter Erin (O’Rourke) with her newborn son, and elderly father-in-law Paddy (Roddy) who is in a vegetative state.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: Brian remains vague about Australia, but expresses his intention to restart the family oyster trapping farm that was abandoned after his departure. Having brought no money or resources himself, Aileen steals bags of oysters from the plant to seed Brian's traps, which is witnessed by Sarah. The next day, local seafood supplier Francie is irate over missing oysters from his order. Aileen blames a lower worker, and finds Sarah heartbroken about her decision to separate from Francie.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: At home, Con confronts Brian about stealing fish from others' traps and selling them himself. Brian storms off and later begins working for another fisherman. Aileen and Brian visit the local pub, where they notice Sarah arrive alone. Brian attempts to rekindle a former romantic relationship they shared in their teenage years, and Aileen returns home by herself.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: The following day, fungus is discovered on the oysters at the processing plant and a moratorium is declared, devastating the community. Amidst the announcement, an already distressed Sarah faints unexpectedly. Aileen receives a call from the police stating that a sexual assault claim has been filed against Brian, who claims that he was at home with his mother the night of their bar outing. She lies to the officer confirming his alibi, and does not question Brian when they drive back home. Sarah goes missing from her shifts.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: Erin decides to visit Sarah at her home, where she confesses to her the events of the sexual assault following the bar encounter. Her story begins to leak around town, namely with the factory coworkers.  Aileen, Brian, and Sarah are summoned to court, where Aileen testifies once more that she was home with Brian during the incident. The court throws out the case due to lack of physical evidence, much to the dismay of Sarah. When Sarah returns back to the processing plant, she is let go due to her repeated absences. On her way out she alludes to Aileen being the cause of Francie’s missing oysters, and Aileen is sent home. At work, the coworkers begin to avoid Aileen, while in the village, Sarah is ostracized by the men.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: As Aileen becomes haunted by the guilt from her actions, Paddy suddenly dies in his sleep.  At the wake, Sarah makes an appearance and spits at Brian. Aisleen intercepts Brian from retaliating. During the reception, an unaffected Brian is seen flirting with a younger girl Emma and Aisleen steps in. Brian loses his temper, and a physical scuffle ensues between him and Con.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: Following their fight, Brian sets out to the family’s oyster plots accompanied with Aileen, who finally confronts him about his assault against Sarah. Brian dismisses her. Noticing the rising tide, Aileen returns back to the boat while the waves quickly overwhelm Brian, who drowns.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: Afterwards, Aileen tells Sarah to stay in the village. Sarah decides that there is too much negative history plaguing her in the town, and drives off ready to start a new life.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: "God's Creatures" was announced on May 22, 2019, when it was reported that Saela Davis and Anna Rose Holmer would direct a then-untitled Gothic film produced by Fodhla Cronin O'Reilly. In June 2020, it was announced that BBC Film, Screen Ireland, and the Western Region Audiovisual Producer's Fund (WRAP) would finance the project. In May 2021, Emily Watson and Paul Mescal joined the cast. Crew members included production designer Inbal Weinberg, cinematographer Chayse Irvin, and editor Julia Bloch.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on 19 May 2022. It was released in the United States in theaters and on demand on 30 September 2022.


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 92% of 71 reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.3/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "Painfully raw yet rewarding, "God's Creatures" explores the limits of a mother's love with an outstanding Emily Watson leading the way" Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 71 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: God's Creatures (film)

text: Screen Rant gave it a 4-star rating. The header summary stated: ""God's Creatures" is an unnerving rural gothic tale with two quietly fierce performances that make the film's slow burn to its climax worth the wait."


title: Oldham

text: Oldham is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, amid the Pennines and between the rivers Irk and Medlock, southeast of Rochdale and northeast of Manchester. It is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, which had a population of 237,110 in 2019.


title: Oldham

text: Within the boundaries of the historic county of Lancashire, and with little early history to speak of, Oldham rose to prominence in the 19th century as an international centre of textile manufacture. It was a boomtown of the Industrial Revolution, and among the first ever industrialised towns, rapidly becoming "one of the most important centres of cotton and textile industries in England." At its zenith, it was the most productive cotton spinning mill town in the world, producing more cotton than France and Germany combined. Oldham's textile industry fell into decline in the mid-20th century; the town's last mill closed in 1998.


title: Oldham

text: The demise of textile processing in Oldham depressed and heavily affected the local economy. Today Oldham is predominantly a commuter town, and the improvement of the town centre is the focus of a project for transforming Oldham into a centre for further education and the performing arts. It is, however, still distinguished architecturally by the surviving cotton mills and other buildings associated with that industry.


title: Oldham

text: In the 2011 United Kingdom census Oldham Built-up area subdivision, as defined by the Office for National Statistics, had a population of 96,555 and an area of , giving a population density of , while the Borough of Oldham had a population of 224,897, an area of area of , and a population density of .


title: Oldham

text: The toponymy of Oldham seems to imply "old village or place" from "Eald" (Saxon) signifying oldness or antiquity, and "Ham" (Saxon) a house, farm or hamlet. Oldham is however known to be a derivative of "Aldehulme", undoubtedly an Old Norse name. It is believed to be derived from the Old English "ald" combined with the Old Norse "holmi" or "holmr", meaning "promontory or outcrop", possibly describing the town's hilltop position. It has alternatively been suggested that it may mean "holm or hulme of a farmer named Alda". The name is understood to date from 865, during the period of the Danelaw. Cumbric "alt", meaning "steep height, cliff", has also been suggested for the first element.


title: Oldham

text: The earliest known evidence of a human presence in what is now Oldham is attested by the discovery of Neolithic flint arrow-heads and workings found at Werneth and Besom Hill, implying habitation 7–10,000 years ago. Evidence of later Roman and Celtic activity is confirmed by an ancient Roman road and Bronze Age archaeological relics found at various sites within the town. Placenames of Celtic origin are still to be found in Oldham: Werneth derives from a Celtic personal name identical to the Gaulish "vernetum", "alder swamp", and Glodwick may be related to the modern Welsh "clawdd", meaning "dyke" or "ditch". Nearby Chadderton is also pre-Anglo-Saxon in origin, from the Old Welsh "cadeir", itself deriving from the Latin "cathedra" meaning "chair". Although Anglo-Saxons occupied territory around the area centuries earlier, Oldham as a permanent, named place of dwelling is believed to date from 865, when Danish invaders established a settlement called Aldehulme.


title: Oldham

text: From its founding in the 9th century until the Industrial Revolution, Oldham is believed to have been little more than a scattering of small and insignificant settlements spread across the moorland and dirt tracks that linked Manchester to York. Although not mentioned in the Domesday Book, Oldham does appear in legal documents from the Middle Ages, invariably recorded as territory under the control of minor ruling families and barons. In the 13th century, Oldham was documented as a manor held from the Crown by a family surnamed Oldham, whose seat was at Werneth Hall. Richard de Oldham was recorded as lord of the manor of Werneth/Oldham (1354). His daughter and heiress, Margery (d.1384), married John de Cudworth (d.1384), from whom descended the Cudworths of Werneth Hall who were successive lords of the manor. A Member of this family was James I's Chaplain, Ralph Cudworth (father of the Cambridge Platonist philosopher Ralph Cudworth). The Cudworths remained lords of the manor until their sale of the estate (1683) to Sir Ralph Assheton of Middleton.


title: Oldham

text: Much of Oldham's history is concerned with textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution; it has been said that "if ever the Industrial Revolution placed a town firmly and squarely on the map of the world, that town is Oldham." Oldham's soils were too thin and poor to sustain crop growing, and so for decades prior to industrialisation the area was used for grazing sheep, which provided the raw material for a local woollen weaving trade.


title: Oldham

text: By 1756, Oldham had emerged as centre of the hatting industry in England. The rough felt used in the production process is the origin of the term "Owdham Roughyed" a nickname for people from Oldham. It was not until the last quarter of the 18th century that Oldham changed from being a cottage industry township producing woollen garments via domestic manual labour, to a sprawling industrial metropolis of textile factories. The climate, geology, and topography of Oldham were unrelenting constraints upon the social and economic activities of the human inhabitants. At above sea level and with no major river or visible natural resources, Oldham had poor geographic attributes compared with other settlements for investors and their engineers. As a result, Oldham played no part in the initial period of the Industrial Revolution, although it did later become seen as obvious territory to industrialise because of its convenient position between the labour forces of Manchester and southwest Yorkshire.


title: Oldham

text: Cotton spinning and milling were introduced to Oldham when its first mill, Lees Hall, was built by William Clegg in about 1778, the beginning of a spiralling process of urbanisation and socioeconomic transformation. Within a year, 11 other mills had been constructed, and by 1818 there were 19 – not a large number in comparison with other local settlements. Oldham's small local population was greatly increased by the mass migration of workers from outlying villages, resulting in a population increase from just over in 1801 to in 1901. The speed of this urban growth meant that Oldham, with little pre-industrial history to speak of, was effectively born as a factory town.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham became the world's manufacturing centre for cotton spinning in the second half of the 19th century. In 1851, over 30% of Oldham's population was employed within the textile sector, compared to 5% across Great Britain. It overtook the major urban centres of Manchester and Bolton as the result of a mill building boom in the 1860s and 1870s, a period during which Oldham became the most productive cotton-spinning town in the world. In 1871, Oldham had more spindles than any country in the world except the United States, and in 1909, was spinning more cotton than France and Germany combined. By 1911 there were 16.4 million spindles in Oldham, compared with a total of 58 million in the United Kingdom and 143.5 million in the world; in 1928, with the construction of the UK's largest textile factory Oldham reached its manufacturing zenith. At its peak, there were more than 360 mills, operating night and day;


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's townscape was dominated by distinctive rectangular brick-built mills. Oldham was hit hard by the Lancashire Cotton Famine of 1861–1865, when supplies of raw cotton from the United States were cut off. Wholly reliant upon the textile industry, the cotton famine created chronic unemployment in the town. By 1863 a committee had been formed, and with aid from central government, land was purchased with the intention of employing local cotton workers to construct Alexandra Park, which opened on 28 August 1865. Said to have over-relied upon the textile sector, as the importation of cheaper foreign yarns grew during the 20th century, Oldham's economy declined into a depression, although it was not until 1964 that Oldham ceased to be the largest centre of cotton spinning. In spite of efforts to increase the efficiency and competitiveness of its production, the last cotton spun in the town was in 1998.


title: Oldham

text: Facilitated by its flourishing textile industry, Oldham developed extensive structural and mechanical engineering sectors during the 18th and 19th centuries. The manufacture of spinning and weaving machinery in Oldham belongs to the last decade of the 19th century, when it became a leading centre in the field of engineering. The Platt Brothers, originated in nearby Dobcross village, but moved to Oldham. They were pioneers of cotton-spinning machinery, developing innovative products that enabled the mass-production of cotton yarn. Platt Brothers became the largest textile machine makers in the world, employing over people in the 1890s, twice the number of their nearest rivals Dobson & Barlow in Bolton and Asa Lees on Greenacres Moor. They were keen investors in the local area and at one time, were supporting 42% of the population. The centre of the company lay at the New Hartford Works in Werneth, a massive complex of buildings and internal railways on a site overlooking Manchester. The railway station which served this site later formed the basis of Oldham Werneth railway station. The main building exists to this day. Platts gained prestigious awards from around the world, and were heavily involved with local politics and civic pride in Oldham. John and James Platt were the largest subscribers for promoting Oldham from a township to a Borough, pledging £100 (more than double the next largest sum) in advance towards any expenses which may have been incurred by the Royal Charter. In 1854 John Platt was made the (fourth) Mayor of Oldham, an office he was to hold twice more in 1855–56 and 1861–62. John Platt was elected in 1865 to become a Member of Parliament (MP) for Oldham, and was re-elected in 1868; he remained in office until his death in 1872. A bronze statue of Platt existed in the town centre for years, though was moved to Alexandra Park. There have been recommendations for it to be returned to the town centre.


title: Oldham

text: Abraham Henthorn Stott, the son of a stonemason, was born in nearby Shaw & Crompton in 1822. He served a seven-year apprenticeship with Sir Charles Barry, before starting a structural engineering practice in Oldham in 1847 that went on to become the pre-eminent mill architect firm in Lancashire. Philip Sydney Stott, third son of Abraham and later titled as Sir Philip Stott, 1st Baronet, was the most prominent and famous of the Stott mill architects. He established his own practice in 1883 and designed over a hundred mills in several countries. His factories, which improved upon his father's fireproof mills, accounted for a 40% increase in Oldham's spindles between 1887 and 1914.


title: Oldham

text: Although textile-related engineering declined with the processing industry, leading to the demise of both Stotts and Platts, other engineering firms existed, notably electrical and later electronic engineers Ferranti in 1896. Ferranti went into receivership in 1993, but some of its former works continue in other hands. Part of the original Hollinwood site was operated by Siemens Metering and Semiconductor divisions. The remainder of the site is occupied by Mirror Colour Print Ltd; the printing division of Reach, which prints and distributes thirty-six major newspapers, and employs five hundred staff.


title: Oldham

text: On the back of the Industrial Revolution, Oldham developed an extensive coal mining sector, correlated to supporting the local cotton industry and the town's inhabitants, though there is evidence of small scale coal mining in the area as early as the 16th century. The Oldham Coalfield stretched from Royton in the north to Bardsley in the south and in addition to Oldham, included the towns of Middleton and Chadderton to the west. The Oldham Coalfield was the site of over 150 collieries during its recorded history. Although some contemporary sources suggest there was coal mining in Oldham at a commercial scale by 1738, older sources attribute the commercial expansion of coal mining with the arrival in the town of two Welsh labourers, John Evans and William Jones, around 1770. Foreseeing the growth in demand for coal as a source of motive and steam power, they acquired colliery rights for Oldham, which by 1771 had 14 colliers. The mines were largely to the southwest of the town around Hollinwood and Werneth and provided enough coal to accelerate Oldham's rapid development at the centre of the cotton boom. At its height in the mid-19th century, when it was dominated by the Lees and Jones families, Oldham coal was mainly sourced from many small collieries whose lives varied from a few years to many decades, although two of the four largest collieries survived to nationalisation. In 1851, collieries employed more than 2,000 men in Oldham, although the amount of coal in the town was somewhat overestimated however, and production began to decline even before that of the local spinning industry. Today, the only visible remnants of the mines are disused shafts and boreholes.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's social history, like that of other former unenfranchised towns, is marked by politicised civil disturbances, as well as events related to the Luddite, Suffragette and other Labour movements from the working classes. There has been a significant presence of "friendly societies". It has been put that the people of Oldham became radical in politics in the early part of the 19th century, and movements suspected of sedition found patronage in the town. Oldham was frequently disturbed by bread and labour riots, facilitated by periods of scarcity and the disturbance of employment following the introduction of cotton-spinning machinery.


title: Oldham

text: On 20 April 1812, a "large crowd of riotous individuals" compelled local retailers to sell foods at a loss, whilst on the same day Luddites numbering in their thousands, many of whom were from Oldham, attacked a cotton mill in nearby Middleton. On 16 August 1819, Oldham sent a contingent estimated at well above 10,000 to hear speakers in St Peter's Fields at Manchester discuss political reform; it was the largest contingent sent to Manchester. John Lees, a cotton operative and ex-soldier who had fought at Waterloo, was one of the fifteen victims of the Peterloo Massacre which followed. The 'Oldham inquest' which proceeded the massacre was anxiously watched; the Court of King's Bench, however, decided that the proceedings were irregular, and the jury were discharged without giving a verdict.


title: Oldham

text: Annie Kenney, born in nearby Springhead, and who worked in Oldham's cotton mills, was a notable member of the Suffragette movement credited with sparking off suffragette militancy when she heckled Winston Churchill, and later (with Emmeline Pankhurst) the first Suffragist to be imprisoned. Oldham Women's Suffrage Society was established in 1910 with Margery Lees as president and quickly joined the Manchester and District Federation of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies. The Chartist and Co-operative movements had strong support in the town, whilst many Oldhamers protested in support of the emancipation of slaves. The Riot Act was read in 1852 on election day following a mass public brawl over the Reform Act, and irregularities with parliamentary candidate nominations.


title: Oldham

text: For three days in late May 2001, Oldham became the centre of national and international media attention. Following high-profile race-related conflicts, and long-term underlying racial tensions between local White British and British Pakistani communities, major riots broke out in the town. Occurring with particular intensity in the Glodwick area of the town, the Oldham riots were the worst racially motivated riots in the United Kingdom for fifteen years prior, briefly eclipsing the sectarian violence in Northern Ireland in the media. At least 20 people were injured in the riots, including 15 police officers, and 37 people were arrested. Similar riots took place in other towns in northern England over the following days and weeks. The 2001 riots prompted governmental and independent inquiries, which collectively agreed on community relations improvements and considerable regeneration schemes for the town. There were further fears of riots after the death of Gavin Hopley in 2002.


title: Oldham

text: Lying within the historic county boundaries of Lancashire since the early 12th century, Oldham was recorded in 1212 as being one of five parts of the thegnage estate of Kaskenmoor, which was held on behalf of King John by Roger de Montbegon and William de Nevill. The other parts of this estate were Crompton, Glodwick, Sholver, and Werneth. Oldham later formed a township within the ancient ecclesiastical parish of Prestwich-cum-Oldham, in the hundred of Salford.


title: Oldham

text: In 1826 commissioners for the social and economic improvement of Oldham were established. The town was made part of a parliamentary borough, in 1832, though it was in 1849 when Oldham was incorporated as a municipal borough, giving it borough status in the United Kingdom, and in 1850 the Borough Council obtained the powers of the improvement commissioners. In 1880, parts of the Hollinwood and Crossbank areas of Chadderton and Ashton-under-Lyne townships were added to the Borough of Oldham. Oldham Above Town and Oldham Below Town were, from 1851 until c. 1881, statistical units used for the gathering and organising of civil registration information, and output of census data.


title: Oldham

text: The Local Government Act 1888 created elected county councils to administer services throughout England and Wales. Where a municipal borough had a population of more than 50,000 at the 1881 Census it was created a county borough, with the powers and duties of both a borough and county council. As Oldham had an 1881 population of 111,343 it duly became a county borough on 1 April 1889. The borough, while independent of Lancashire County Council for local government, remained part of the county for purposes such as the administration of justice and lieutenancy.


title: Oldham

text: In 1951 parts of the Limehurst Rural District were added to the County Borough of Oldham, and in 1954 further parts of the same district added to it on its abolition. Since 1961, Oldham has been twinned with Kranj in Slovenia. Under the Local Government Act 1972, the town's autonomous county borough status was abolished, and Oldham has, since 1 April 1974, formed part of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, within the Metropolitan county of Greater Manchester.


title: Oldham

text: The boundaries of two parliamentary constituencies divide Oldham: Oldham East and Saddleworth, and Oldham West and Royton (which includes the town centre), represented by Labour Members of Parliament (MPs) Debbie Abrahams and Jim McMahon respectively.


title: Oldham

text: Created as a parliamentary borough in 1832, Oldham's first parliamentary representatives were the radicals William Cobbett and John Fielden. Winston Churchill began his political career in Oldham. Although unsuccessful at his first attempt in 1899, Churchill was elected as the member of Parliament for the Oldham parliamentary borough constituency in the 1900 general election. He held the constituency for the Conservative Party until the 1906 general election, when he won the election for Manchester North West as a Liberal MP. After he became the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 1940, Churchill was made an Honorary Freeman of the Borough of Oldham, on 2 April 1941.


title: Oldham

text: In the 2016 European Union membership referendum, Oldham heavily voted in favour of Brexit. The vote to leave was 60.9%.


title: Oldham

text: At (53.5444°, −2.1169°), and north-northwest of London, Oldham stands above sea level, northeast of Manchester city centre, on elevated ground between the rivers Irk and Medlock. Saddleworth and the South Pennines are close to the east, whilst on all other sides, Oldham is bound by other neighbouring towns, including Ashton-under-Lyne, Chadderton, Failsworth, Royton and Shaw and Crompton, with little or no green space between them. Oldham experiences a temperate maritime climate, like much of the British Isles, with relatively cool summers and mild winters. There is regular but generally light precipitation throughout the year. On 23 November 1981, an F1/T2 tornado formed over Hollinwood and later passed over Oldham town centre, causing some damage.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's topography is characterised by its rugged, elevated Pennine terrain. It has an area of . The geology of Oldham is represented by the Millstone Grit and Coal Measures series of rocks. The River Beal, flowing northwards, forms the boundary between Oldham on one side and Royton and Shaw and Crompton on the other.


title: Oldham

text: To the east of this river the surface rises to a height of at Woodward Hill, on the border with the parish of Saddleworth. The rest of the surface is hilly, the average height decreasing towards the southwest to Failsworth and the city of Manchester. The ridge called Oldham Edge, high, comes southward from Royton into the centre of the town.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's built environment is characterised by its 19th-century red-brick terraced houses, the infrastructure that was built to support these and the town's former cotton mills – which mark the town's skyline. The urban structure of Oldham is irregular when compared to most towns in England, its form restricted in places by its hilly upland terrain. There are irregularly constructed residential dwellings and streets clustered loosely around a central business district in the town centre, which is the local centre of commerce. In 1849, Angus Reach of Inverness said:


title: Oldham

text: There is a mixture of high-density urban areas, suburbs, semi-rural and rural locations in Oldham. There is some permanent grassland but overwhelmingly the land use in the town is urban. The territory of Oldham is contiguous with other towns on all sides except for a small section along its eastern and southern boundaries, and for purposes of the Office for National Statistics, forms the fourth largest settlement of the Greater Manchester Urban Area, the United Kingdom's third largest conurbation. The M60 motorway passes through the southwest of Oldham, through Hollinwood, and a heavy rail line enters Oldham from the same direction, travelling northeast to the town centre before heading northwards through Derker towards Shaw and Crompton.


title: Oldham

text: Many of Oldham's present divisions and suburbs have origins as pre-industrial hamlets, manorial commons and ancient chapelries. Some, such as Moorside, exist as recently constructed residential suburbia, whilst places like Hollinwood exist as electoral wards and thoroughly industrialised districts. Throughout most of its recorded history, Oldham was surrounded by large swathes of moorland, which is reflected in the placenames of Moorside, Greenacres moor, Littlemoor, Northmoor among others.


title: Oldham

text: A large portion of Oldham's residences are "low value" Victorian era Accrington red-brick terraced houses in a row formation, built for the most part from 1870 to 1920, to house the town's cotton mill workers. There is more modern housing in the semi-rural east of the town, in the most sought after area in areas such as the village Moorside, although terraces are found in almost all parts of Oldham.


title: Oldham

text: One of the oldest recorded named places of Oldham is Hathershaw, occurring in a deed for 1280 with the spelling "Halselinechaw Clugh". Existing as a manor in the 15th century, Hathershaw Hall was the home of a Royalist family in the 17th century who lost part of their possessions due to the English Civil War. Waterhead, an upland area in the east of Oldham, traces its roots to a water cornmill over the border in Lees.


title: Oldham

text: Recorded originally as "Watergate" and "Waterhead Milne", it was for a long time a hamlet in the parish of Oldham that formed a significant part of the Oldham Above Town registration sub-district. Derker was recorded as a place of residence in 1604 with the name "Dirtcar". Bound by Higginshaw to the north, Derker is the location of Derker railway station and, said to have terraced residencies "unsuited to modern needs", is currently being redeveloped as part of the Housing Market Renewal Initiative.


title: Oldham

text: Coldhurst, an area along Oldham's northern boundary with Royton, was once a chapelry and the site of considerable industry and commerce, including coal mining, cotton spinning and hat manufacture. It is said to have been the scene of an action in the English Civil War in which the Parliamentarians were defeated.


title: Oldham

text: According to data from the United Kingdom Census 2001, Oldham had a total resident population of 103,544, making it the 55th most populous settlement in England, and the 5th most populous settlement of the Greater Manchester Urban Area. This figure in conjunction with its area provides Oldham with a population density of 3,998 people per square mile (1,544 per km). The local population has been described as broadly "working class"; the middle classes tending to live in outlying settlements.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham, considered as a combination of the 2001 electoral wards of Alexandra, Coldhurst, Hollinwood, St. James, St. Marys, St. Pauls, Waterhead and Werneth, has an average age of 33.5, and compared against the average demography of the United Kingdom, has a high level of people of South Asian heritage, particularly those with roots in Pakistan and Bangladesh. Due to the town's prevalence as an industrial centre and thus a hub for employment, Oldham attracted migrant workers throughout its history, including those from wider-England, Scotland, Ireland and Poland.


title: Oldham

text: During the 1950s and 1960s, in an attempt to fill the shortfall of workers and revitalise local industries, citizens of the wider Commonwealth of Nations were encouraged to migrate to Oldham and other British towns. Many came from the Caribbean and Indian subcontinent and settled throughout the Oldham borough.


title: Oldham

text: Today, Oldham has large communities with heritage from Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and parts of the Caribbean. At the time of the 2001 census, over one in four of its residents identified themselves as from a South Asian or British Asian ethnic group. Cultural divisions along ethnic backgrounds are strong within the town, with poor cross-community integration and cohesion along Asian and white backgrounds.


title: Oldham

text: With only a small local population during medieval times, as a result of the introduction of industry, mass migration of village workers into Oldham occurred, resulting in a population change from under 2,000 in 1714 to 12,000 in 1801 to 137,000 in 1901 In 1851 its population of 52,820 made Oldham the 12th most populous town in England. The following is a table outlining the population change of the town since 1801, which demonstrates a trend of rapid population growth in the 19th century and, after peaking at 147,483 people in 1911, a trend of general decline in population size during the 20th century.


title: Oldham

text: In 2011, 77.5% of the Oldham metropolitan borough population were White British, 18.1% Asian and 1.2% Black. While in the town of Oldham, which had a 2011 population of 96,555, 55.4% of the population were White British, 37.6% Asian and 2% Black.


title: Oldham

text: For years Oldham's economy was heavily dependent on manufacturing industry, especially textiles and mechanical engineering. Since the deindustrialisation of Oldham in the mid-20th century, these industries have been replaced by home shopping, publishing, healthcare and food processing sectors, though factory-generated employment retains a significant presence. Many of the modern sectors are low-skill and low-wage.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's town centre contains the highest concentration of retailing, cultural facilities and employment in the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham. It has been extensively redeveloped during the last few decades, and its two shopping centres, Town Square and the Spindles, now provide one of the largest covered retail areas in Greater Manchester. The Spindles (named with reference to textile spindles) is a modern shopping centre with over 40 retailers, banks, building societies and catering outlets. It houses several of Europe's largest stained glass works, a series of ceilings and skylights created by local artist Brian Clarke in celebration of the life and music of one of Oldham's famous sons, composer and conductor Sir William Walton.


title: Oldham

text: A number of culinary and medical advances have been developed in Oldham. The tubular bandage was invented and developed in Oldham in 1961. That "vital contribution to advancing medical science" resulted from a collaboration between local firm Seton and a cotton manufacturer in the town. There are claims that Oldham was the birthplace of the first chip shop. The sometimes disputed claim of trade in deep-fried chipped potatoes is said to have been started around 1858–60 from an outlet owned by a John Lees, on what is the present site of Oldham's Tommyfield Market. In 1900 Oldham had the highest concentration of chip shops in the country, one for every 400 people. Rag Pudding is a savoury dish said to be native to Oldham. Yates Wine Lodge was founded in Oldham by Peter and Simon Yates in 1884.


title: Oldham

text: Park Cake Bakeries, sold in 2007 by Northern Foods Group to Vision Capital, have a large food processing centre in Hathershaw, which employs in excess of 1,600 people. Over 90% of the cakes produced go to Marks & Spencer. Long existing as an industrial district, Hollinwood is home to the Northern Counties Housing Association,


title: Oldham

text: Ferranti Technologies is an electronic, electromechanical and electrical engineering company based in Waterhead.


title: Oldham

text: The majority of poor families are now working families. Coldhurst in Oldham has child deprivation rate of 62.1pc, which is the worst in the UK.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Athletic's contribution to the local economy have been strengthened by its community links as well as its fortunes on the field. Despite some success in the early 20th century which almost saw the club win the Football League title in 1915, the club has spent most of its time outside the top division of English football, including a 68-year spell between 1923 and 1991 – when it won promotion to the First Division a year before it became the FA Premier League. The club then survived for three years in the FA Premier League, which encouraged high attendances and boosted the club's finances as well as boosting the local economy as it struggled to recover from post-industrial decline. Between 1990 and 1994, the club also reached two FA Cup semi-finals (taking Manchester United to a replay on both occasions) and were on the losing side in a Football League Cup final. The club's subsequent years, however, have been less successful, with relegation in 2018 to the fourth tier of the English league for the first time in almost 50 years. The club's financial situation has also declined, as have its attendances, in accordance with fortunes on the pitch.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's Old Town Hall is a Grade II listed Georgian neo-classical town hall built in 1841, eight years before Oldham received its borough status. One of the last purpose-built town halls in northwest England, it has a tetrastyle Ionic portico, copied from the temple of Ceres, on the River Ilissos, near Athens. Winston Churchill made his inaugural acceptance speech from the steps of the town hall when he was first elected as a Conservative MP in 1900. A Blue Plaque on the exterior of the building commemorates the event. Long existing as the political centre of the town, complete with courtrooms, the structure stood empty for many years from the mid-1980s and was regularly earmarked for redevelopment as part of regeneration project proposals, but none were actioned before plans dating to 2012 were completed in 2016.


title: Oldham

text: In September 2008, it was reported that "Oldham Town Hall is only months away from a major roof collapse". A tour taken by local councillors and media concluded with an account that "chunks of masonry are falling from the ceilings on a daily basis ... the floors are littered with dead pigeons and ... revealed that the building is literally rotting away". In October 2009 the Victorian Society, a charity responsible for the study and protection of Britain's Victorian and Edwardian architecture, declared Oldham Town Hall as the most endangered Victorian structure in England and Wales.


title: Oldham

text: Plans to convert the hall into a leisure complex, incorporating a cinema and restaurants, were revealed in May 2012 with the hall itself being used for public consultation. This £36.72 million project was completed in 2016.


title: Oldham

text: In the heart of Oldham's retail district, the Old Town Hall has been developed into a modern multiplex Odeon cinema.


title: Oldham

text: Erected as a permanent memorial to the men of Oldham who were killed in the First World War, Oldham's war memorial consists of a granite base surmounted by a bronze sculpture depicting five soldiers making their way along the trenches in order to go into battle. The main standing figure, having climbed out of the trenches, is shown calling on his comrades to advance, and is the same figure used at the Royal Fusiliers War Memorial in London and the 41st Division memorial at Flers in France. The base serves to house books containing the roll of honour of the 1st, 10th and 24th Battalions, Manchester Regiment. The pedestal has two bronze doors at either side.


title: Oldham

text: Commissioned in 1919 by the Oldham War Memorial Committee, the memorial was designed and built by Albert Toft. It was unveiled by General Sir Ian Hamilton on 28 April 1923, before a crowd estimated at over 10,000. The monument was intended to symbolise the spirit of 1914–1918.


title: Oldham

text: The Civic Centre tower is the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham's centre of local governance. The 15-storey white-brick building has housed the vast majority of the local government's offices since its completion in 1977. Standing at the summit of the town, the tower stands over high. It was designed by Cecil Howitt & Partners, and the topping out ceremony was held on 18 June 1976. The Civic Centre can be seen as far away as Salford, Trafford, Wythenshawe and Winter Hill in Lancashire, and offers panoramic views across the city of Manchester and the Cheshire Plain.


title: Oldham

text: The Oldham Parish Church of St. Mary with St. Peter, in its present form, dates from 1830 and was designed in the Gothic Revival Style by Richard Lane, a Manchester-based architect. It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade II* listed building. It was linked with the church of St Mary the Virgin, Prestwich and together the sites were principal churches of the ancient ecclesiastical parish of Prestwich-cum-Oldham.


title: Oldham

text: A church building had existed on the site since 1280. During this time, a small chapel stood on the site to serve the local townships of Oldham, Chadderton, Royton and Crompton. This was later replaced by an Early English Gothic church in the 15th century. With the coming of the Industrial Revolution, the population of Oldham increased at a rapid rate (from under 2,000 in 1714, to over 32,000 by 1831). The rapid growth of the local population warranted that the building be rebuilt into the current structure. Though the budget was originally agreed at £5,000, the final cost of building was £30,000, one third of which was spent on the crypt structure. Alternative designs by Sir Charles Barry, the designer of the Palace of Westminster, although now regarded by some as superior, were rejected. The Church, of the Anglican denomination, is in active use for worship, and forms part of the Diocese of Manchester.


title: Oldham

text: There are also Roman Catholic churches in Oldham. These include Our Lady of Mount Carmel and St Patrick Church. It was built in 1870, was founded by priests from St Mary's Church in Oldham, and is a Grade II listed building.


title: Oldham

text: The geography of Oldham constrained the development of major transport infrastructure, with the former County Borough Council suggesting that "if it had not grown substantially before the railway age it would surely have been overlooked". Oldham has never been on a main-line railway route, and canals too have only been able to serve it from a distance, meaning that "Oldham has never had a train service worthy of a town of its size".


title: Oldham

text: A principal destination along the former Oldham Loop Line, Oldham once had six railway stations but this was reduced to three once Clegg Street, Oldham Central and Glodwick Road closed in the mid-20th century. Oldham Werneth, Oldham Mumps and Derker closed on 3 October 2009. Trains from Manchester Victoria station to Oldham had to climb steeply through much of its route, from around at Manchester city centre to around at Oldham Mumps. The Werneth Incline, with its gradient of 1 in 27, made the Middleton Junction to Oldham Werneth route the steepest regular passenger line in the country. The Werneth Incline route closed in 1963. It had been replaced as the main route to Manchester by the section of line built between Oldham Werneth Station and Thorpes Bridge Junction, at Newton Heath in May 1880. Oldham Mumps, the second oldest station on the line after Werneth, took its name from its location in the Mumps area of Oldham, which itself probably derived from the archaic word "mumper" which was slang for a beggar. The former Oldham Loop Line was converted for use with an expanded Metrolink light rail network, and renamed as the Oldham and Rochdale Line. The line between Victoria and a temporary Oldham Mumps tram stop opened on 13 June 2012, and more central stops opened on 27 January 2014.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham had electric tramways to Manchester in the early 20th century; the first tram was driven from Manchester into Oldham in 1900 by the Lord Mayor of Manchester. The system came to an end on 3 August 1946, however. There was also a short-lived Oldham trolleybus system, in 1925–26. Oldham bus station has frequent bus services to Manchester, Rochdale, Ashton-under-Lyne and Middleton with other services to the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, Tameside, and across the Pennines to Huddersfield in West Yorkshire. The roof canopy is supported internally on two rows of steel trees. The extensive use of glass and stainless steel maximises visibility, and there is a carefully co-ordinated family of information fittings, posters and seating, using robust natural materials for floors and plinths. The bus station is used by National Express coaches. First Greater Manchester has its headquarters in Oldham.


title: Oldham

text: Despite the Turnpike Act 1734, Oldham had no turnpike road to Manchester for another 56 years and Church Lane, Oldham remained part of the main street through the town. But following a further Act of Parliament a turnpike was constructed. The first regular coach service to Manchester came into operation in October 1790, with a journey time of over 2 hours and a fare 2s.8d (about 13p), with half fare for travellers on top of the coach.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham is about south of the major M62 motorway, but is linked to it by the M60 at Hollinwood, and A627(M) via Chadderton. There are major A roads to Ashton-under-Lyne, Huddersfield, Manchester, and Rochdale.


title: Oldham

text: The Hollinwood Branch of the Ashton Canal was a canal that ran from Fairfield in Droylsden, through Littlemoss and Daisy Nook Country Park to the Hollinwood area of Oldham, with a branch from Daisy Nook to the Fairbottom Branch Canal. The canal was mainly used for the haulage of coal until it fell into disuse for commercial traffic in the 1930s. It included four aqueducts and a two-rise lock staircase.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Rugby League football club was established in 1876 as Oldham Football Club. Renamed in 1997 to Oldham R.L.F.C., it has achieved several club honours during its history, winning the Rugby Football League Championship five times and Challenge Cup three times. They played at Watersheddings for years before joining Oldham Athletic A.F.C. at Boundary Park until 2010 when they moved to Oldham Borough's previous ground, Whitebank Stadium.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Athletic Association Football Club, known as The Latics, was founded in 1895 as Pine Villa Football Club. Oldham Athletic have achieved both league and cup successes, particularly under Joe Royle in the 1990s. They were Football League runners-up in the last season before the outbreak of the First World War, but were relegated from the Football League First Division in 1923. They reached the Football League Cup final in 1990 and won the Football League Second Division title in 1991, ending 68 years outside the top flight. They secured their top division status a year later to become founder members of the new Premier League, but were relegated after two seasons despite reaching that year's FA Cup semi-finals. they play in EFL League Two, the fourth tier of the English league.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Borough F.C. was established in 1964 as Oldham Dew FC, and after many years playing under the name of Oldham Town changed its name to Oldham Boro in 2009, finally becoming known as Oldham Borough just months before it folded. The team played in the North West Counties Football League before going out of existence in 2015, just over 50 years after it was founded.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Netball Club's senior team is the 2019–2020 national league division 1 champion and has won seven out of the last eight titles. Former players include England's most capped player Jade Clarke.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham has league cricket teams with a number of semi-professional league clubs including Oldham CC, and Werneth CC, both playing in the Greater Manchester Cricket League (GMCL). Oldham CC was one of the founding members, in 1892, of the Central Lancashire Cricket League, which closed in 2015.


title: Oldham

text: The Manchester Fencing Centre in Oldham opened in 2015 in the former Osborne Mill, and at was said to be "the largest centre of its kind". The Marshall Fencing Club trains there, under head coach and Commonwealth games medallist Stuart Marshall, and in 2019 won six gold medals at eight national ranking events.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham produced someone who is considered to be one of the greatest benefactors of education for the nation, Hugh Oldham, who in 1504 was appointed as Bishop of Exeter, and later went on to found what is now Manchester Grammar School.


title: Oldham

text: University Campus Oldham is a centre for higher education and a sister campus of the University of Huddersfield. It was opened in May 2005 by actor Patrick Stewart, the centre's Chancellor. The University Campus Oldham presented actress Shobna Gulati and artist, Brian Clarke (both born in Oldham) with an Honorary Doctorate of Letters at the Graduation Ceremony of November 2006, for their achievements and contributions to Oldham and its community.


title: Oldham

text: Home Office policing in Oldham is provided by the Greater Manchester Police. The force's "(Q) Division" have their headquarters for policing the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham at central Oldham. Public transport is co-ordinated by Transport for Greater Manchester. Statutory emergency fire and rescue service is provided by the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, which has two stations in Oldham; at Hollins on Hollins Road, and at Clarksfield on Lees Road.


title: Oldham

text: The Royal Oldham Hospital, at Oldham's northern boundary with Royton, is a large NHS hospital administrated by Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust. It was opened under its existing name on 1 December 1989. Formerly known as Oldham District and General, and occupying the site of the town's former workhouse (named Oldham Union Workhouse in 1851), the hospital is notable for being the birthplace of Louise Joy Brown – the world's first successful "In vitro" fertilised "test tube baby", on 25 July 1978.


title: Oldham

text: Waste management is co-ordinated by the local authority via the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority. Locally produced inert waste for disposal is sent to landfill at the Beal Valley. Oldham's distribution network operator for electricity is United Utilities; there are no power stations in the town. United Utilities also manages Oldham's drinking and waste water; water supplies being sourced from several local reservoirs, including Dovestone and Chew. There is a water treatment works at Waterhead.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham, though lacking in leisure and cultural amenities, is historically notable for its theatrical culture. Once having a peak of six ""fine"" theatres in 1908, Oldham is home to the Oldham Coliseum Theatre and the Oldham Theatre Workshop, which have facilitated the early careers of notable actors and writers, including Eric Sykes, Bernard Cribbins and Anne Kirkbride, daughter of acclaimed cartoonist Jack Kirkbride who worked for the "Oldham Evening Chronicle". Oldham Coliseum Theatre is one of Britain's last remaining repertory theatres; Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel performed there in the early 20th century, and contemporary actors such as Ralph Fiennes and Minnie Driver, among others, have appeared more recently.


title: Oldham

text: During the 19th century the circus was a popular entertainment in Oldham; Pablo Fanque's circus was a regular visitor, filling a 3,000-seat amphitheatre on Tommyfield in 1869. Formerly criticised for its lack of a cinema, there are plans to develop an "Oldham West End". Oldham has a thriving bar and night club culture, if you consider one nightclub (Liquid and Envy) as a thriving nightlife.


title: Oldham

text: The Lyceum is a Grade II listed building opened in 1856 at a cost of £6,500 as a "mutual improvement" centre for the working men of Oldham. The facilities provided to members included a library, a newsroom and a series of lectures on geology, geography and education, microscopy and chemistry, female education and botany. Instrumental music was introduced and there were soon sixteen violinists and three cellists. Eventually the building was extended to include a school of science and art. Music had always been important in the life of the Lyceum, and in 1892 a school of music was opened, with 39 students enrolled for the "theory and practice of music".


title: Oldham

text: The Lyceum continued throughout the 20th century as a centre for the arts in Oldham. The Lyceum Players are a current amateur theatre company entering its 93rd year. They put on a varied programme of productions each season and the theatre is on the ground floor of the Lyceum building. In 1986 the local authority was invited by its directors and trustees to accept the building as a gift. The acceptance of the Lyceum building by the Education Committee provided the opportunity to move the music centre and "further enhance the cultural activities of the town". In 1989 the Oldham Metropolitan Borough Music Centre moved into the Lyceum building, which is now the home of the Oldham Lyceum School of Music.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham's museum and gallery service dates back to 1883. Since then it has established itself as a cultural focus for Oldham and has developed one of the largest and most varied permanent collections in North West England. The current collection includes over 12,000 social and industrial history items, more than 2,000 works of art, about 1,000 items of decorative art, more than 80,000 natural history specimens, over 1,000 geological specimens, about 3,000 archaeological artefacts, 15,000 photographs and a large number of books, pamphlets and documents. Meanwhile, the Rifle Street drill hall dates back to 1897.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham is now home to a newly built state-of-the-art art gallery, Gallery Oldham, which was completed in February 2002 as the first phase of the Oldham Cultural Quarter. Later phases of the development saw the opening of an extended Oldham Library, a lifelong learning centre and there are plans to include a performing arts centre.


title: Oldham

text: The annual Oldham Carnival started around 1900, although the tradition of carnivals in the town goes back much further, providing a "welcomed respite from the tedium of everyday life". The carnival parade was always held in mid-to-late summer, with the primary aim of raising money for charities. It often featured local dignitaries or popular entertainers, in addition to brass, military and jazz bands, the Carnival Queen, people in fancy dress, dancers and decorated floats from local churches and businesses. Whenever possible, local people who had attained national celebrity status were invited to join the cavalcade. The carnival's route began in the town centre, wound its way along King Street, and ended with a party in Alexandra Park.


title: Oldham

text: The carnival fell out of favour in the late 1990s but was resurrected by community volunteers in 2006 and rebranded the Peoples' Carnival. The parade was moved into Alexandra Park in 2011. The event hosts live stages and other activities alongside a parade in the park. 2016 marked ten years since the carnival was reinstated by volunteers. The main organiser is Paul Davies who runs the carnival with a number of committee members and volunteers.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham has had a pattern of success in the "best city" category in the national Britain in Bloom competition, winning in 2012 and 2014, and in several following years and gaining a gold award in 2019.


title: Oldham

text: Oldham Council financially support the awards, one of only five local authorities in the North West to do so.


title: Oldham

text: People from Oldham are called Oldhamers, though "Roughyed" is a nickname from the 18th century when rough felt was used in Oldham to make hats. Edward Potts was a renowned architect who moved to Oldham from Bury. He was the architect for fourteen mills in the Oldham area. Other notable persons with Oldham connections include the composer Sir William Walton, former British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill, the artist Brian Clarke, and Louise Brown, the world's first baby to be conceived by "in vitro" fertilisation.


title: Oldham

text: Notable media personalities from Oldham include presenter Nick Grimshaw, actors Eric Sykes, Bernard Cribbins and Christopher Biggins, Ricky Whittle, TV host Phillip Schofield, actress Shobna Gulati, actress/comedian Dora Bryan, actress Anne Kirkbride, actress Olivia Cooke physicist and science educator Brian Cox, television presenter John Stapleton and comedy double act Cannon and Ball.


title: Oldham

text: Notable musicians from Oldham include the Inspiral Carpets, N-Trance and Mark Owen of boyband Take That as well as the founding members of the rock band Barclay James Harvest.


title: Oldham

text: Notable charity mountaineer, the first British Muslim to climb Mount Everest, Akke Rahman, of Bengali heritage, is from Oldham.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: In sociolinguistics, a register is a variety of language used for a particular purpose or in a particular communicative situation. For example, when speaking officially or in a public setting, an English speaker may be more likely to follow prescriptive norms for formal usage than in a casual setting, for example, by pronouncing words ending in "-ing" with a velar nasal instead of an alveolar nasal (e.g., "walking" rather than "walkin"'), choosing words that are considered more "formal" (such as "father" vs. "dad" or "child" vs. "kid"), and refraining from using words considered nonstandard, such as "ain't" and "y'all".


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: As with other types of language variation, there tends to be a spectrum of registers rather than a discrete set of obviously distinct varieties—numerous registers can be identified, with no clear boundaries between them. Discourse categorisation is a complex problem, and even in the general definition of "register" given above (language variation defined by use rather than user), there are cases where other kinds of language variation, such as regional or age dialect, overlap. Due to this complexity, scholarly consensus has not been reached for the definitions of terms such as "register", "field", or "tenor"; different scholars' definitions of these terms are often in direct contradiction of each other.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: Additional terms such as diatype, genre, text types, style, acrolect, mesolect, basilect, sociolect, and ethnolect, among many others, may be used to cover the same or similar ground. Some prefer to restrict the domain of the term "register" to a specific vocabulary (which one might commonly call slang, jargon, argot, or cant), while others argue against the use of the term altogether. Crystal and Davy, for instance, have critiqued the way the term has been used "in an almost indiscriminate manner". These various approaches with their own "register", or set of terms and meanings, fall under disciplines such as sociolinguistics, stylistics, pragmatics, or systemic functional grammar.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: The term "register" was first used by the linguist T. B. W. Reid in 1956, and brought into general currency in the 1960s by a group of linguists who wanted to distinguish among variations in language according to the "user" (defined by variables such as social background, geography, sex and age), and variations according to "use", "in the sense that each speaker has a range of varieties and choices between them at different times". The focus is on the way language is used in particular situations, such as legalese or motherese, the language of a biology research lab, of a news report, or of the bedroom.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: M. A. K. Halliday and R. Hasan interpret "register" as "the linguistic features which are typically associated with a configuration of situational features – with particular values of the field, mode and tenor...". Field for them is "the total event, in which the text is functioning, together with the purposive activity of the speaker or writer; includes subject-matter as one of the elements". Mode is "the function of the text in the event, including both the channel taken by language – spoken or written, extempore or prepared – and its genre, rhetorical mode, as narrative, didactic, persuasive, 'phatic communion', etc." The tenor refers to "the type of role interaction, the set of relevant social relations, permanent and temporary, among the participants involved". These three values – field, mode and tenor – are thus the determining factors for the linguistic features of the text. "The register is the set of meanings, the configuration of semantic patterns, that are typically drawn upon under the specified conditions, along with the words and structures that are used in the realization of these meanings." Register, in the view of M. A. K. Halliday and R. Hasan, is one of the two defining concepts of text. "A text is a passage of discourse which is coherent in these two regards: it is coherent with respect to the context of situation, and therefore consistent in register; and it is coherent with respect to itself, and therefore cohesive."


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: One of the most analyzed areas where the use of language is determined by the situation is the formality scale. The term "register" is often, in language teaching especially, shorthand for formal/informal style, although this is an aging definition. Linguistics textbooks may use the term "tenor" instead, but increasingly prefer the term "style" – "we characterise styles as varieties of language viewed from the point of view of formality" – while defining "registers" more narrowly as specialist language use related to a particular activity, such as academic jargon. There is very little agreement as to how the spectrum of formality should be divided.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has defined the international standard ISO 12620, "Management of terminology resources – Data category specifications". This is a registry for registering linguistic terms used in various fields of translation, computational linguistics and natural language processing and defining mappings both between different terms and the same terms used in different systems. The registers identified are:


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: The term "diatype" is sometimes used to describe language variation which is determined by its social purpose. In this formulation, language variation can be divided into two categories: dialect, for variation according to "user", and diatype for variation according to "use" (e.g. the specialised language of an academic journal). This definition of diatype is very similar to those of "register".


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: The distinction between dialect and diatype is not always clear; in some cases a language variety may be understood as both a dialect and a diatype.


title: Register (sociolinguistics)

text: Diatype is usually analysed in terms of "field", the subject matter or setting; "tenor", the participants and their relationships; and "mode", the channel of communication, such as spoken, written or signed.


title: IHeartMedia

text: iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company founded by Lowry Mays and B. J. "Red" McCombs in 1972, and later taken private by Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners through a leveraged buyout in 2008. As a result of this buyout, Clear Channel Communications, Inc., began to operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of CC Media Holdings, Inc. On September 16, 2014, CC Media Holdings, Inc. was rebranded iHeartMedia, Inc., and Clear Channel Communications, Inc., became iHeartCommunications, Inc.


title: IHeartMedia

text: iHeartMedia, Inc. specializes in radio broadcasting, podcasting, digital and live events through division iHeartMedia (sans "Inc." suffix; formerly Clear Channel Media and Entertainment, Clear Channel Radio, et al.) and subsidiary iHeartMedia and Entertainment, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Broadcasting, Inc.); the company owns more than 850 full-power AM and FM radio stations in the U.S., making it the country's largest owner of radio stations. The company has also been involved in internet radio and podcasting via the digital platform iHeartRadio (from which the company derives its current name).


title: IHeartMedia

text: In the past, the company was also involved in live events and out-of-home advertising. The company spun off these businesses in 2005 and 2019 respectively, as the present-day Live Nation Entertainment and Clear Channel Outdoor.


title: IHeartMedia

text: Clear Channel Communications purchased its first FM station in San Antonio in 1972. The company purchased the second "clear channel" AM station WOAI in 1975. In 1976, the company purchased its first stations outside of San Antonio. KXXO (now KAKC) and KMOD-FM in Tulsa were acquired under the name "San Antonio Broadcasting" (same as KEEZ). Stations were also added in Port Arthur, Texas (KPAC-AM-FM, now KDEI and KTJM, from Port Arthur College) and El Paso, Texas (KELP, now KQBU) from John Walton Jr. In 1992, the U.S. Congress relaxed radio ownership rules slightly, allowing the company to acquire more than 2 stations per market. By 1995, Clear Channel owned 43 radio stations and 16 television stations. When the Telecommunications Act of 1996 became law, the act deregulated media ownership, allowing a company to own more stations than previously allowed. Clear Channel went on a subsequent buying spree, purchasing more than 70 other media companies and individual stations.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In a few cases, following purchase of a competitor, Clear Channel was forced to divest some of its stations, as it was above the legal thresholds in some cities. In 2005, the courts ruled that Clear Channel must also divest itself of some "border blaster" radio stations in international border cities, such as the alternative rock radio station XETRA-FM ("91X") in Tijuana, Baja California/San Diego.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In 1997 Clear Channel moved out of pure broadcasting when it purchased billboard firm Eller Media, which was led by Karl Eller.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In 1998 it made its first move outside of the United States when it acquired the leading UK outdoor advertising company More Group plc, which was led by Roger Parry; Clear Channel went on to buy many other outdoor advertising, radio broadcasting, and live events companies around the world, which were then re-branded Clear Channel International. These included a 51% stake in Clear Media Ltd. in China.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In 1999, the company acquired Jacor Communications, a radio corporation based in Cincinnati. The company also made an investment in the new satellite radio service XM Satellite Radio, giving it the rights to program a selection of stations on the service (which would be drawn from some of its stations and syndicated output).


title: IHeartMedia

text: R. Steven Hicks and Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst began Capstar Broadcasting in 1996, and a year later had become the largest owner of radio stations in the country, with 243 stations in total. In August 1997, Capstar and Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst announced plans to acquire SFX Broadcasting, with the resulting company owning 314 stations in 79 markets and ranking as the third-largest radio group by income. A year later, Chancellor Media Corporation and Capstar Broadcasting Corporation announced a merger that would result in Chancellor Media owning 463 stations in 105 markets when the deal was completed in second quarter 1999. Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst owned 59 percent of Capstar, with 355 stations in 83 markets, and was the largest single owner of Chancellor (which had 108 stations in 22 markets), with 15 percent of the stock. Chancellor Media later became AMFM Inc., which was acquired by Clear Channel in a deal announced October 3, 1999, and valued at $17.4 billion. The resulting company would own 830 radio stations, 19 television stations, and over 425,000 outdoor displays in 32 countries.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In 2000, Clear Channel acquired Robert F. X. Sillerman's SFX Entertainment, a concert promoter that had focused on consolidation of regional promoters under a national operation. In 2005, Clear Channel spun off its entertainment and live events business as Live Nation.


title: IHeartMedia

text: On November 16, 2006, Clear Channel announced plans to go private, being bought out by two private-equity firms, Thomas H. Lee Partners and Bain Capital Partners for $26.7 billion, which included their assumption of $8 billion in Clear Channel debt. This was just under a 10 percent premium above its closing price of $35.36 a share on November 16 (the deal values Clear Channel at $37.60 per share). In a separate transaction also announced on November 16, 2006, Clear Channel said it would seek buyers for all of its television stations and 539 of its smaller radio stations, because the private-equity buyers were not interested in owning television or small-market radio. Over a hundred stations were assigned to Aloha Station Trust, LLC upon the consummation of the merger. The television stations were sold to Newport Television, a broadcaster owned by Providence Equity Partners, on April 23, 2007.


title: IHeartMedia

text: Due to the credit market crunch of 2007, Clear Channel had difficulty selling some of its radio stations. Clear Channel's attempt to sell off over 100 stations to GoodRadio.TV, LLC was rejected by the equity firm backing the deal. The deal then shifted to Frequency License LLC, but took longer to resolve itself as the two parties were engaged in lawsuits. On top of that, the sale of Clear Channel's television portfolio to Newport Television had also turned uncertain, as Providence considered other options, although this transaction was ultimately completed.


title: IHeartMedia

text: On December 4, 2007, Clear Channel announced that they had extended the termination date of the buyout from December 12, 2007, to June 12, 2008. On July 24, 2008, Clear Channel held a special shareholder meeting, during which the majority of shareholders accepted a revised $36-per-share offer from Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners. Shareholders received either $36 in cash, or one share of CC Media Class A common stock for each share of Clear Channel common stock held. The company announced that it would move to more centralized programming and lay off 1,500 employees, or approximately 7% of its workforce, on January 20, 2009. The reasoning was bleak economic conditions and debt from its transition to a private company. By the completion of the restructuring in May 2009, a total of 2,440 positions were eliminated.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In early 2010, it was announced that the company was facing the possibility of bankruptcy due to its "crippling debt". After 21 years, Mark Mays stepped down as president and CEO of Clear Channel on June 23, 2010. Mays remained as chairman of the board. On October 2, 2011, Robert W. "Bob" Pittman, who was then the company's Chairman of Media and Entertainment Platforms, was named CEO of CC Media Holdings.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In August 2013, Clear Channel sold its minority stake in Sirius XM for $135.5 million. This also resulted in the removal of most Clear Channel-programmed stations on the service, besides simulcasts of WHTZ and KIIS-FM.


title: IHeartMedia

text: On January 6, 2014, Clear Channel announced a marketing partnership with Robert F. X. Sillerman's SFX Entertainment (a second incarnation of a live events company that had been sold to Clear Channel, which spun off to form Live Nation), to collaborate on electronic dance music content for its digital and terrestrial radio outlets, including a Beatport top 20 countdown show. The partnership expanded upon the company's existing EDM-oriented outlets (such as "Evolution"). Staff, including John Sykes, believed that the deal (particularly the Beatport countdown show) would help provide a higher level of national exposure to current and up and coming EDM artists.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In September 2014, it was announced that the company would be renamed from Clear Channel Communications to iHeartMedia, alluding to its iHeartRadio platform to reflect the company's growing emphasis on digital media and internet radio. The previous name "Clear Channel" came from AM broadcasting, referring to a channel (frequency) on which only one station transmits. In the U.S., clear-channel stations have exclusive rights to their frequencies throughout most of the continent at night, when AM signals travel far due to skywave. CEO Bob Pittman explained that the company had been "doing progressive stuff", yet they were still "named after AM radio stations".


title: IHeartMedia

text: In 2016, one of the company's directors, Julia B. Donnelly, left the board of iHeartCommunications and was replaced by Laura A. Grattan, a director at Thomas H. Lee. Grattan was named to the board of managers of iHeartMedia Capital I, LLC, the direct parent of iHeartCommunications, as well as the board of directors of iHeartMedia, Inc., the indirect parent of iHeartCommunications.


title: IHeartMedia

text: Since 2008, iHeartMedia had struggled to pay down more than $20 billion in debt the company assumed from its leveraged buyout. Various media outlets, including Bloomberg News, Reuters, "Radio Ink", and iHeartMedia's hometown newspaper the "San Antonio Express-News", claimed that either bankruptcy or a major restructuring was likely. On April 20, 2017, the company warned investors that it might not survive over the following 10 months. On November 30, 2017, it was reported that a group of creditors had rejected iHeartMedia's latest debt restructuring proposal, instead bringing out a deal where the company might file for bankruptcy. On March 15, 2018, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and claimed that it reached an agreement to restructure $10 billion of its over $20 billion in debt.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In September 2018, iHeartMedia acquired HowStuffWorks' podcast network Stuff Media for $55 million. On November 19, 2018, iHeartMedia announced its intent to acquire Jelli, the provider of a programmatic advertising platform for radio stations.


title: IHeartMedia

text: In January 2019, the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas approved a creditor-supported plan for iHeartMedia to exit bankruptcy, which would reduce the company's debt from $16.1 billion to $5.75 billion. The plan included the spin-out of iHeartMedia's 89.1% stake in its out-of-home advertising division Clear Channel Outdoor. In April 2019, the company also filed a proposed initial public offering.


title: IHeartMedia

text: iHeartMedia emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May 2019, with a new board of directors and the spin-out of Clear Channel Outdoor, but maintaining its existing leadership of CEO Bob Pittman and president Rich Bressler. Rather than pursue its IPO (which was estimated to potentially be valued at $1.1 billion), iHeartMedia instead received approval for a direct listing on the Nasdaq.