title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: To create the effect of the Angels rocking the TARDIS Mulligan and Robertson threw themselves around the ship's set. The camera's operator then shook the camera in the opposite direction that Mulligan and Robertson threw themselves. The scene wherein the Doctor talks to Sally via a DVD extra was created by writing a conversation, removing Sally's lines, then having David Tennant record his lines. Moffat felt that this one-way filming made the performance more convincing. Moffat initially wrote placeholder dialogue in the script for the scene where the Doctor tells Sally that he can hear her in the DVD shop, because he knew the lines that appeared would have to play "double duty later on" and be authentic and fresh both times. Gold called the sequences "the heart of the Chinese puzzle".


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: "Blink" was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC One on 9 June 2007. Overnight ratings showed that it was watched by 6.1 million viewers, which rose to 6.62 once time-shifted viewers were taken into account. The episode was the seventh most watched episode on BBC One for the week ending 10 June and was the lowest-rated episode of "Doctor Who" third series. It received an Appreciation Index of 87, considered "excellent". In its initial broadcast, a short clip of a card reading "One Year Later" was shown before the episode's denouement. In the syndicated and the DVD version, this shot has been removed.


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: A Region 2 DVD containing "Blink" together with the episodes "Human Nature" and "The Family of Blood" was released on 23 July 2007. It was re-released as part of the complete series three DVD on 5 November 2007.


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: "Blink" received universal critical acclaim, with many praising the acting, the script, the level of fear and the Weeping Angels themselves. "The Guardian" Stephen Brook called it a "wonderfully creepy episode" that "ultimately made sense" despite "barely featur[ing] the Doctor and Martha". David Bradley of "SFX" awarded "Blink" five out of five stars, saying that it could have featured any of the previous Doctors and predicted that its "timelessness" would ensure that it would "[go] down as one of the finest, scariest, cleverest "Who" episodes ever". IGN's Travis Fickett gave the episode 9.1 out of 10, praising the way the audience felt they had known Sally Sparrow for a while, as well as the strength of Mulligan's performance, although he noted that "all of the performances in this episode are exceptional". He concluded that, "it's difficult to believe that so much was accomplished in such a short amount of time. The story of not one, but two relationships was told, several time lines intersected and a new and rather frightening enemy was vanquished without The Doctor ever coming face to face with them". Ross Ruedinger of "Slant Magazine" believed that the episode was not just the best "Doctor Who" episode, but also a great episode of the science fiction and horror genre that could allow it to stand alone. He also praised the fear-inducing concept of the Weeping Angels as well as the "tenderness of the story and the characters" which were "quite intricate given how much is going on in these 45 minutes". "The Daily Telegraph" named the episode one of the best of the show's entire run, noting that, while the Doctor "is somewhat on the periphery here", it "adds to the threat".


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: Many critics consider the episode one of the strongest during Tennant's time as the Doctor. IGN's Matt Wales named it the sixth best episode of Tennant's tenure, while Sam McPherson of TVOvermind listed it as the second best Tenth Doctor episode. In 2011, before the second half of the sixth series, "The Huffington Post" labelled "Blink" as one of the five essential episodes for new viewers to watch. The Weeping Angels also received critical praise. In 2009 "SFX" named the climax with the Weeping Angels advancing on Sally and Larry the scariest moment in "Doctor Who" history, describing it as "a terrifying combination of scary concept and perfect direction". The Weeping Angels came in at number three in Neil Gaiman's "Top Ten New Classic Monsters" in "Entertainment Weekly", while TV Squad named them the third scariest television characters. They were also rated the third-best "baddie" in "Doctor Who" by "The Daily Telegraph", behind the Nestene Consciousness and Daleks. In 2009 "SFX" listed the Angels in their list of favourite things of the revival of "Doctor Who", writing, "Scariest. Monsters. Ever."


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: Writer Steven Moffat was awarded the 2008 BAFTA Craft and BAFTA Cymru awards for Best Writer for his work on this episode. "Blink" won the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form, and Carey Mulligan received the Constellation Award for Best Female Performance in a 2007 Science Fiction Television Episode. The episode was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Script, but lost to "Pan's Labyrinth" by Guillermo del Toro.


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: "Blink" received the award for Best Story in the "Doctor Who Magazine" 2007 Survey. In "Doctor Who Magazine" 2009 poll to find the greatest "Doctor Who" story ever, it came in second place after Peter Davison's final story, "The Caves of Androzani". In a 2007 poll conducted by the BBC, taking votes from 2,000 readers of the "Doctor Who Adventures" magazine, the Weeping Angels were voted the scariest monsters of 2007 with 55% of the vote; the Master and the Daleks took second and third place with 15% and 4% of the vote. In a 2012 poll of over ten thousand respondents conducted by the "Radio Times", the Weeping Angels were again voted the best "Doctor Who" monster with 49.4% of the vote. In "Doctor Who Magazine" 2014 fan poll of the greatest episodes of all time, "Blink" again came in second, this time behind the 2013 episode "The Day of the Doctor".


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: Moffat, after becoming lead writer of the programme, wrote "The Time of Angels" and "Flesh and Stone" for the fifth series as a more action-oriented sequel that brought back the Weeping Angels, believing that good monsters should come back with a different style of story. They also returned in "The Angels Take Manhattan" from the show's seventh series , featured in the mini-episode, "Good as Gold", written by children for a "Blue Peter" contest and have made cameo appearances in the episodes "The God Complex", "The Time of the Doctor", "Hell Bent", "Revolution of the Daleks" and in the finale to the first series of the "Doctor Who" spin-off, "Class". They are also featured in the New Series Adventures novel "Touched by an Angel" by Jonathan Morris.


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: A line spoken by the Doctor, "The angels have the phone box", is rhetorically repeated by Larry and prompts him to say "I've got that on a T-shirt". As expected by Moffat and Gold, this led online retailers such as ThinkGeek, and Zazzle, among others, to offer versions of such a product for sale. In addition, the "wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey" line has been used to describe several of Moffat's complex time travel stories, such as "Let's Kill Hitler" and "The Big Bang". The line was also referenced in the first episode of the fifth series, "The Eleventh Hour", when the Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith) scans the crack in young Amelia Pond's (Caitlin Blackwood) wall with his sonic screwdriver. BBC America created a series of four specials prior to the seventh series premiere of "Doctor Who", including one entitled "The Timey-Wimey Stuff of Doctor Who".


title: Blink (Doctor Who)

text: British "Timelord rock" band Chameleon Circuit, composed of YouTube bloggers Alex Day and Charlie McDonnell among others, wrote a song about the episode, also entitled "Blink", and released it on their debut eponymous album.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome at America's Center is a multi-purpose stadium used for concerts, major conventions, and sporting events in downtown St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Previously known as the Trans World Dome from 1995 to 2001 and the Edward Jones Dome from 2002 to 2016, it was constructed largely to lure a National Football League (NFL) team back to St. Louis and to serve as a convention space.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome received its initial main tenant with the arrival of the NFL's St. Louis Rams, who relocated to the city in 1995. The Rams spent the next twenty-one seasons at the Dome, departing after the 2015 NFL season to return to Los Angeles. The St. Louis BattleHawks of the revived XFL began play at the stadium in early 2020.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome provides multiple stadium configurations that can seat up to 82,624 people. Seating levels include a private luxury suite level with 120 suites, a private club seat and luxury suite level with 6,400 club seats, a concourse level (lower bowl) with 28,352 seats, and a terrace level (upper bowl) with 29,400.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome is part of the America's Center convention center. The convention portion has a much bigger footprint and adjoins to the west of the Dome, Cole Street to the north, Broadway to the east, and Convention Plaza to the south. The stadium is serviced by the Convention Center MetroLink rail station.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The stadium's exterior facade is clad in brick, limestone, and precast concrete tinted to resemble red sandstone. The intended effect was for the venue to less resemble a stadium, and more resemble the look of public libraries and city school buildings built in the era preceding World War II.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: In 1988, the St. Louis Cardinals left St. Louis for Phoenix, Arizona, leaving St. Louis without a National Football League team. Looking to re-enter the league, St. Louis proposed building a domed stadium for a team to play in and attaching the Dome to the convention center to expand convention center capacity. The funding for the project was accomplished via public bonds beginning in 1989. In 1991, St. Louis put in for an NFL expansion franchise for 1995 called the St. Louis Stallions and began construction on The Dome in 1992. However, in 1993, the league chose Charlotte, North Carolina, and Jacksonville, Florida, over St. Louis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: After St. Louis came up short in its expansion bid, it appeared that the city might land a new team anyway. Advertising executive James Orthwein, a St. Louis native and member of the Busch family, bought the New England Patriots in 1992 from Victor Kiam to resolve a debt between the two men. The Patriots had long been in financial malaise since original owner Billy Sullivan, who was still the team president during Kiam's ownership, had squandered all of his net worth on a series of bad investments in the mid-1980s and was forced to sell the team to Kiam and Foxboro Stadium to Robert Kraft. Immediately upon purchase, Orthwein made it clear that he wanted to relocate the team from Foxborough, Massachusetts to St. Louis and was to leave New England at the end of the 1993 season. Orthwein's plans to move the team however were thwarted when Kraft refused to let Orthwein out of the long-term lease that he had secured from Kiam and Sullivan as part of his purchase of the stadium. Orthwein did not want to own the team if he could not move it, and Kraft initiated a hostile takeover that resulted in his purchase of the Patriots in 1994.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The then under-construction Dome finally received the NFL tenant it was looking for in 1995 when Georgia Frontiere announced she would relocate her Los Angeles Rams to St. Louis for the 1995 season. This move was initially voted down, with 21 opposed, three in favor (the Rams, Cincinnati Bengals and Tampa Bay Buccaneers), and six abstaining. The other owners (led by Buffalo's Ralph Wilson, the Jets' Leon Hess, the Giants' Wellington Mara, Washington's Jack Kent Cooke, Arizona's Bill Bidwill and Minnesota's John Skoglund) believed that the Rams' financial problems were caused by Frontiere's mismanagement. When Frontiere threatened to sue the league, commissioner Paul Tagliabue acquiesced to Frontiere's demands. As part of the relocation deal, the city of St. Louis guaranteed that the stadium's amenities would be maintained in the top 25% of all NFL stadiums. After playing their first four home games of the 1995 season at Busch Memorial Stadium because the Dome was not ready, the Rams' first game in the stadium on Sunday, November 12, 1995, was a 28–17 win over the Carolina Panthers.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome received a $30 million renovation in 2009, which replaced the scoreboards with LED video displays (one large in north end zone and one smaller in south end zone) and LED fascia boards around the bowl of the Dome. The renovations also added new premium areas (Bud Light Zone and Clarkson Jewelers Club). Some of the paint work in the Dome was lightened as well and painted in Rams colors (Blue, Gold, and White). In 2010, the Rams locker room was re-built and switched ends from the north end zone to the south end zone. For 2011, new HD monitors were installed throughout the Dome in place of the older screens at concession stands and other areas.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Before the 2010 season, the Dome also received a new permanent turf surface. The surface, manufactured by AstroTurf, is AstroTurf's Magic Carpet II Conversion System, which features its GameDay 3D Synthetic Turf System. This system is similar to the original turf system that was in the Dome from 1995 to 2004 whereas it can be rolled up and stored underground in a pit at the Dome. The Dome used a FieldTurf brand surface from 2005 to 2009.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome's primary problem throughout the years centered on a lease signed by the Rams when they came to St. Louis in 1995. For the first decade, the Dome was considered a fine facility, but eventually the Rams and city leaders became concerned with the Dome's long-term viability.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Under the terms of the lease that the Rams signed in 1995, the Dome was required to be ranked in the top quartile of NFL stadiums through 2015, measured at 10 year intervals. This meant the Dome had to have the proper fan amenities and other features found in modern NFL stadiums. If the building was not ranked in the top quartile, the Rams were free to break the lease and either relocate without penalty or continue to lease the Dome on a year-to-year basis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Not helping matters was the Dome's poor reception with NFL fans and the general public as the years went by. Even after the 2010 renovations many websites ranking the 31 NFL stadiums listed the Dome near the bottom of their respective rankings. In 2008, for a "Sports Illustrated" poll, St. Louis fans ranked it the worst out of any NFL stadium at the time with particularly low marks for tailgating, affordability and atmosphere. "Time" magazine in May 2012 ranked the Dome as the 7th worst major sports stadium in the United States. The Dome's exterior was regarded as an "urban eyesore from the get-go, an ugly multi-purpose dome that's one defining feature was its inability to fit into any conceivable cityscape...[that] takes up several city blocks but never developed any reasonable interesting business around it: It has always looked like a huge mall from that sad time in recent American history when cities bragged about how big of a mall they could build". Inside, the Dome was "too vast and too cavernous to hold a lot of sound...[and] was the sort of building that felt empty even when it was full", even during the "Greatest Show on Turf" halcyon days of the Rams.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: In 2005, the rankings indicated that the Dome was no longer in the top quartile as mandated by the lease, which gave the Rams the right to begin the process of breaking the lease, or reverting to a year-to-year. The Rams, wishing to afford St. Louis ample opportunity to meet the quartile requirement, instead agreed to waive this right for the 2005 checkpoint in return for $30 million of renovations and improvements. However, both the Rams and city leaders realized at this time that long-term, the Dome needed a major overhaul or St. Louis would again risk losing the Rams after 2015.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: With the 2015 deadline looming, the Convention and Visitor Center (the stadium's operator) and the Rams negotiated throughout 2012 on the renovations and agreed to go into arbitration in 2013 if a deal was not worked out in which three arbitrators mutually agreed on from the American Arbitration Association to arbitrate the case in 2013.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: In January 2012, the CVC proposed $48 million in improvements including a new 947-vehicle garage, all funded publicly, with the Rams keeping the garage game-day revenue.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: After the Rams rejected the $48 million deal, the CVC next proposed $124 million in renovations including a new three-story structure on Baer Plaza on the east side facing the Mississippi River for a main entrance as well as new suites. This proposal had the Rams picking up $64 million of that project, the CVC citing an approximate percentage of what other NFL teams had chipped in for on similar renovations.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Rams countered with a $700 million proposal that called for much of the stadium to be rebuilt including a sliding roof panel and a new four-sided center scoreboard, the Rams asserting that this would satisfy the "first tier" top quartile requirement relative to the current NFL stadium landscape. No details on how to pay for the renovations were made. The sides did not hammer out an agreement in 2012 and the matter went into arbitration hearings in January 2013. Officials noted that even if the arbitrators decided on implementing a more expensive plan and the CVC was unable to fund it the Rams would still be able to break the lease.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: With no agreement between both sides in 2013 there was considerable speculation on the future of both the Rams and the stadium with some suggesting the Rams could return to Los Angeles. Further pressure for St. Louis to resolve the issue was that bonds for construction of the Dome were still being paid and would continue to be paid through 2021. Missouri was paying $12 million/year and the City and County of St. Louis were each paying $6 million/year.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On February 1, 2013, the arbitrators ruled in favor of the Rams' $700 million proposal to tear down half the Dome and replace it as the only way among the options presented to bring the Dome up to first-tier status. Various city and county officials said it was unlikely that public funding would be found for such a project. Officials noted that the Rams were contractually obligated to play in the Dome until March 15, 2015, and there was no "buy out" provision to permit the Rams to move before then. City and county officials said they were considering all options including construction of a new stadium elsewhere in the St. Louis area. Rams officials, meanwhile, indicated their preference to stay in St. Louis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The St. Louis Regional Convention (the stadium's owner) and Sports Complex Authority hired Goldman Sachs in February 2013 "to keep the Rams in the Dome, or, if that's not possible, to maintain a National Football League team in St. Louis." An attorney for St. Louis noted that Goldman had "financed or advised on the financing of every NFL stadium recently built." In April 2013, it was reported by the "Wall Street Journal" that the arrangement was being scrutinized by the Securities and Exchange Commission as new Dodd–Frank rules restricted firms from offering financial advice to municipalities where it also underwrites its municipal bond transactions. Eventually the hiring fell through and nothing resulted from it.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On July 2, 2013, the CVC announced that they were rejecting the Rams' renovation proposal. Missouri governor Jay Nixon had been negotiating with owner Stan Kroenke since the decision had been made. The earliest the Rams could have broken the lease on the Dome was following the 2014 season, but they chose not to do so in 2014.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On January 31, 2014, both the "Los Angeles Times" and the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch" reported that Stan Kroenke purchased approximately 60 acres of land adjacent to the Forum in Inglewood, California. Commissioner Roger Goodell represented that Mr. Kroenke informed the league of the purchase. Kroenke subsequently announced plans to build an NFL stadium on the site, in connection with the owners of the adjacent Hollywood Park site, Stockbridge Capital Group. This development further fueled rumors that the Rams intended to return its management and football operations to Southern California. The land was initially targeted for a Walmart Supercenter but Walmart could not get the necessary permits to build it. On January 5, 2015, "The Los Angeles Times" reported that Stan Kroenke and Stockbridge Capital Group were partnering up in developing a new NFL stadium on the Inglewood property owned by Kroenke. The project included a stadium with up to 80,000 seats and a performance venue of up to 6,000 seats while reconfiguring the previously approved Hollywood Park plan for up to of retail, of office space, 2,500 new residential units, a 300-room hotel and of public parks, playgrounds, open space and pedestrian and bicycle access. The stadium would likely be ready by 2019.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: In lieu of this St. Louis countered with a stadium plan on the north riverfront area of downtown, known as National Car Rental Field, with the hope of persuading Kroenke to keep the Rams in the city. However, on February 24, 2015, the Inglewood City Council approved the stadium and the initiative with construction planned to begin in December 2015.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: This generated further debate between the NFL, St. Louis, and the Rams as to whether the Rams should be allowed to relocate when a "first tier" stadium plan was in process. The NFL and the Rams countered that the stadium plan was developed outside of the agreed-upon lease and "first tier" remediation and arbitration process, and therefore could not be considered a binding factor in preventing the Rams from relocating. In addition, the NFL and the Rams expressed concerns over the funding and maintenance of the proposed stadium, which they felt shifted too much of the costs of construction and maintenance to the Rams organization. Ultimately, as the Inglewood stadium would be built without taxpayer subsidy, that effectively sealed the fate of the Rams in St. Louis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The last Rams game at The Dome was on Thursday, December 17, 2015, which they won, 31–23 over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The Rams formally filed their request to leave St. Louis for Los Angeles on January 4, 2016. On January 12, the NFL approved the Rams' request for relocation to Los Angeles for the 2016 NFL season.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Once the team left, Missouri taxpayers shouldered the remaining $144 million in debt and maintenance costs on the stadium until the debt was paid off in 2021. In the immediate time period after the Rams left the Dome was mainly used for concerts and events overflow from America's Center, including the September 18, 2018 St. Louis stop for Taylor Swift's Reputation Stadium Tour. The Dome still suffers from several design flaws that make it less and less desirable as a convention center. More recently, the Regional Sports Authority has called for additional upgrades to the Dome, to remain competitive for attracting events. Upgrades in lighting, sound, video boards, and various amenities could cost as much as $300 million. Upgrades like this would continue to bring big concerts and conventions to St. Louis, and potentially allow the city to bid for large sporting events like the NCAA Men's Basketball Final Four and College Football Bowl Games. The renewal of the Illinois–Missouri football rivalry in 2026 could also potentially be held at the Dome. Similar upgrades were made to the Alamodome in San Antonio, which after $50 million in upgrades hosted the 2018 Final Four.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On November 27, 2018, sources confirmed plans by the XFL to place one of their 8 teams in St. Louis, whose five home games would be played in the Dome during the league's inaugural season in 2020. This marked the first time professional football had been played in St. Louis since the loss of the Rams. Officials at the Dome also confirmed they had previously been in talks with the former Alliance of American Football, but had to turn down hosting a team due to scheduling conflicts in spring of 2019. A busy season for the Dome, including hosting a Boat Show, a Monster Jam event, a Garth Brooks concert, and an AMA Supercross Championship event, meant that the Dome did not have five open weekends to host football games. This left an opening for the XFL to fill, which began play in spring 2020.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On December 5, 2018, at a press conference at MetLife Stadium, Oliver Luck, the then-CEO and Commissioner of the XFL, announced that St. Louis had been awarded a team. The Dome is one of two XFL venues with a roof. Along with the Alamodome, Camping World Stadium and Lumen Field, it is one of four XFL venues in a downtown city center.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On December 10, 2018, news outlets released the agreement between the league and the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission. The XFL pay a $300,000 deposit and $100,000 for every game played in the Dome. The XFL receives 100% of ticket revenue, and the CVC receives 100% of concessions and catering revenue. This contract was signed for three seasons.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: At the time, XFL games did not use any seats at the Terrace Level of the Dome, bringing the capacity for games down to about 30,000. Given the high ticket sales, the team considered using the Terrace Level, but with the season truncated by the COVID-19 pandemic, those plans never came to fruition.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The first XFL game at the Dome was held on Sunday, February 23, 2020, when the BattleHawks defeated the New York Guardians by a score of 29–9. Opening Day attendance was the highest in the XFL at 29,554.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: During its planning and construction, the Dome was known as The Dome at America's Center. Trans World Airlines, a St. Louis-based air carrier, purchased naming rights in 1995 and held them until 2001, when TWA was acquired by American Airlines (American already had its name on two NBA/NHL venues in Dallas and Miami). During this time, the Dome was known as the Trans World Dome.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The facility then briefly reverted to the Dome at America's Center until the naming rights were acquired on January 25, 2002, by Edward Jones Investments, a financial services firm based in St. Louis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: As part of a deal to sell the naming rights to Rams Park (dubbed at the time the Russell Athletic Training Center), the Rams' training facility in Earth City, Missouri, to sportswear manufacturer Russell Athletic, the Rams agreed to rename the Edward Jones Dome to Russell Athletic Field for the Rams' "Monday Night Football" game against the Chicago Bears on December 11, 2006. The renaming was for the one night only.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: After the St. Louis Rams relocated to Los Angeles in 2016, Edward Jones exercised its right to terminate its sponsorship, and the facility was once again known as The Dome at America's Center.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome hosted five NFL playoff games, including the and s, both of which the Rams won. The city's previous NFL franchise, the St. Louis Cardinals, never hosted a playoff game in their history with the city (1960–1987); all of the playoff games they played were on the road.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome hosted a soccer friendly match on October 13, 2007, when the United States women's national soccer team (USWNT) played Mexico women's national football team. The United States won 5–1. Attendance for the match was 10,861.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome hosted a soccer match on August 10, 2013, when Real Madrid and Internazionale played a friendly game in front of 54,184 fans, a record attendance for a soccer match in St. Louis.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: In April 2005, the Edward Jones Dome hosted the 2005 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament Final Four. Louisville, Illinois, Michigan State and North Carolina met, with North Carolina winning the title game against Illinois.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome has hosted an NCAA Men's Basketball Regional four times. In 2004, the St. Louis Regional saw Georgia Tech defeat Kansas in a final that required overtime. Tech had previously defeated Nevada while KU became the first team (and the only one to date) to score 100 points in a college basketball game in the building in its regional semifinal win over UAB. The Dome also hosted the 2007 Midwest Regional, where Florida, en route to winning its second consecutive national championship, defeated Butler and then Oregon, who had defeated UNLV in the other regional semifinal. In 2010, Michigan State eliminated Northern Iowa, and Tennessee knocked off Ohio State, before MSU beat UT to move on to the Final Four. In 2012, North Carolina beat Ohio University and Kansas defeated NC State University. In the regional final, KU defeated UNC to advance to the Final Four.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Edward Jones Dome hosted the first Big 12 Conference football championship game in 1996 (Nebraska versus Texas). The third game, in 1998, was also held in the Dome (Kansas State versus Texas A&M). The Dome has also been a neutral site for regular-season college football match ups between the University of Illinois and the University of Missouri, promoted locally as the "Arch Rivalry". Missouri has won all six games (2002, 2003, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010). On October 3, 2022, the University of Missouri announced a return of Mizzou Football to St. Louis. Mizzou will play the University of Memphis Tigers on September 23, 2023. The Tigers last played in St. Louis in 2010, a 23–13 win over Illinois, the final game of the Arch Rivalry Series, which ran from 2002 to 2010. Mizzou went 6–0 in that series. The game is part of a new partnership with the St. Louis Sports Commission which will host multiple Mizzou athletic events in the St. Louis area during the 2023-24 season – the Mizzou To The Lou Series.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome held the annual Missouri State High School Activities Association football championship games from 1996 to 2015. The Show-Me Bowl had previously been contested at Faurot Field in Columbia, Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, Robert W. Plaster Stadium in Springfield and Busch Memorial Stadium. MSHSAA had chosen to move to the Dome mostly because it was an indoor facility, as the football championships occurred in December. With the Rams' departure and anticipated end of football at the facility, the MSHSAA voted to return to rotating hosts, with Springfield getting the 2016 championship and Columbia in 2017. As of 2022 all games are played at Faurot Field in Columbia, Missouri.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: On Saturday, July 23, 2016, the Isaac Bruce Foundation hosted a charity flag football game to raise money for the Isaac Bruce Foundation and relive great memories from the Rams' time in St. Louis. Many members of the Greatest Show on Turf including Kurt Warner, Dick Vermeil, Mike Martz, Torry Holt, Ricky Proehl, Az Hakim, Marc Bulger, Orlando Pace, Aeneas Williams, and many others were among the players and coaches involved. At halftime, 2016 Pro Football Hall of Fame and longtime Rams All-Pro left tackle Orlando Pace was honored. Retired Navy Petty Officer Generald Wilson performed the National Anthem. The former "Voice of the Rams" Steve Savard called the game live on 101 ESPN radio in St. Louis. 10,600 fans were on hand for the game.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Currently, the building hosts the annual Joyce Meyer Ministries Love Life Women's Conference, attended by 10,000 to 20,000 women each year. The building also hosts the Church of God in Christ's annual Holy Convocation. Other major religious conventions/conferences include:


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: The Dome hosted 35th edition of the WWE Royal Rumble pay-per-view event on January 29, 2022. This was the first WWE event to be held in the building, and WWE announced a record attendance of 44,390 fans.


title: The Dome at America's Center

text: Former Cardinals and Rams football players were included in the St. Louis Ring of Fame in the Dome. During the Rams' time in St. Louis the names were displayed on an overhang surrounding the field. Bold indicates those elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.


title: Jesse Dylan

text: Jesse Byron Dylan (born January 6, 1966) is an American film director and production executive. He is the founder of the media production company Wondros and Lybba, a non-profit organization. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and TED. He is the son of musician Bob Dylan and former model Sara Lownds and brother of singer-songwriter Jakob Dylan.


title: Jesse Dylan

text: Dylan was born in New York City, and is the eldest son of musician Bob Dylan and Sara Lownds Dylan. His parents are from Jewish families. His siblings include Anna Lea (b. July 11, 1967), Samuel Isaac Abraham (b. July 30, 1968) and Jakob Luke (b. December 9, 1969). In addition, his father adopted Sara's daughter from a prior marriage, Maria Lownds (b. October 21, 1961). Bob and Sara Dylan divorced when Jesse was 11 years old.


title: Jesse Dylan

text: Dylan began his career directing music videos for clients including Tom Waits, Elvis Costello, Tom Petty, Lita Ford, Public Image Limited and Lenny Kravitz. Dylan is also known for providing the cover photo of Waits' 1992 album "Bone Machine".


title: Jesse Dylan

text: In 2008, he directed the will.i.am Emmy Award-winning music video "Yes We Can," inspired by Barack Obama's campaign for President. The film was created in three days, and featured over 30 celebrity supporters singing then-Candidate Barack Obama's New Hampshire Primary concession speech. Originally posted on YouTube, "Yes We Can" received over 26 million views just days after its release, and was recognized by AdAge in 2012 as one of the most influential political ads of all time.


title: Jesse Dylan

text: His feature film directorial work consists of comedies such as "Kicking and Screaming", starring Will Ferrell and Robert Duvall, "American Wedding" and "How High". Other feature-length projects include the documentary "," which explores the culture of gangs and systemic violence in South Los Angeles. He produced the film for director Stacy Peralta who premiered it at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Dylan also produced and directed an original television series, "CONversations with Ricky Jay," which was built around sleight of hand artist Ricky Jay.


title: Jesse Dylan

text: In 2007, Dylan launched Lybba, a non-profit organization focused on the open source healthcare movement. The project, according to Fast Company, "combines the latest verified medical data with social networking to allow patients and health-care professionals to make informed decisions." The self-professed goal of the project is "to create an online central repository of medical information." Since their foundation, Lybba has worked with such partners as the Collaborative Chronic Care Network (C3N) and Early Development Systems Initiative (EDSI).


title: Jesse Dylan

text: In 2020, Dylan was the director and executive producer of "Soros", examining the personal history and public activism of George Soros, the billionaire investor and philanthropist.


title: World War I reparations

text: Following the ratification of article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles at the conclusion of World War I, the Central Powers were made to give war reparations to the Allied Powers. Each of the defeated powers was required to make payments in either cash or kind. Because of the financial situation in Austria, Hungary, and Turkey after the war, few to no reparations were paid and the requirements for reparations were cancelled. Bulgaria, having paid only a fraction of what was required, saw its reparation figure reduced and then cancelled. Historians have recognized the German requirement to pay reparations as the "chief battleground of the post-war era" and "the focus of the power struggle between France and Germany over whether the Versailles Treaty was to be enforced or revised."


title: World War I reparations

text: The Treaty of Versailles (signed in 1919) and the 1921 London Schedule of Payments required Germany to pay 132 billion gold marks [all values are contemporary, unless otherwise stated]) in reparations to cover civilian damage caused during the war. This figure was divided into three categories of bonds: A, B, and C. Of these, Germany was required to pay towards 'A' and 'B' bonds totaling 50 billion marks () unconditionally. The payment of the remaining 'C' bonds was interest free and contingent on the Weimar Republic's ability to pay, as was to be assessed by an Allied committee.


title: World War I reparations

text: Due to the lack of reparation payments by Germany, France occupied the Ruhr in 1923 to enforce payments, causing an international crisis that resulted in the implementation of the Dawes Plan in 1924. This plan outlined a new payment method and raised international loans to help Germany to meet its reparation commitments. Despite this, by 1928 Germany called for a new payment plan, resulting in the Young Plan that established the German reparation requirements at 112 billion marks () and created a schedule of payments that would see Germany complete payments by 1988. With the collapse of the German economy in 1931, reparations were suspended for a year and in 1932 during the Lausanne Conference they were cancelled altogether. Between 1919 and 1932, Germany paid less than 21 billion marks in reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: The German people saw reparations as a national humiliation; the German Government worked to undermine the validity of the Treaty of Versailles and the requirement to pay. British economist John Maynard Keynes called the treaty a Carthaginian peace that would economically destroy Germany. His arguments had a profound effect on historians, politicians, and the public at large. Despite Keynes' arguments and those by later historians supporting or reinforcing Keynes' views, the consensus of contemporary historians is that reparations were not as intolerable as the Germans or Keynes had suggested and were within Germany's capacity to pay had there been the political will to do so. Following the Second World War, West Germany took up payments. The 1953 London Agreement on German External Debts resulted in an agreement to pay 50 percent of the remaining balance. The final payment was made on 3 October 2010, settling German loan debts in regard to reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: In 1914, the First World War broke out. For the next four years fighting raged across Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. On 8 January 1918, United States President Woodrow Wilson issued a statement that became known as the Fourteen Points. In part, this speech called for Germany to withdraw from the territory it had occupied and for the formation of a League of Nations. During the fourth quarter of 1918, the Central Powers began to collapse. In particular, the German military was decisively defeated on the Western Front and the German navy mutinied, prompting domestic uprisings that became known as the German Revolution.


title: World War I reparations

text: Most of the war's major battles occurred in France and the French countryside was heavily scarred in the fighting. Furthermore, in 1918 during the German retreat, German troops devastated France's most industrialized region in the north-east (Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin). Extensive looting took place as German forces removed whatever material they could use and destroyed the rest. Hundreds of mines were destroyed along with railways, bridges, and entire villages. Prime Minister of France Georges Clemenceau was determined, for these reasons, that any just peace required Germany to pay reparations for the damage it had caused. Clemenceau viewed reparations as a way of weakening Germany to ensure it could never threaten France again. His position was shared by the French electorate. Reparations would also go towards the reconstruction costs in other countries, including Belgium, which were also directly affected by the war. Despite domestic pressure for a harsh settlement, British Prime Minister David Lloyd George opposed overbearing reparations. He argued for a smaller sum, which would be less damaging to the German economy with a long-term goal of ensuring Germany would remain a viable economic power and trading partner. He also argued that reparations should include war pensions for disabled veterans and allowances for war widows, which would reserve a larger share of the reparations for the British Empire. Wilson opposed these positions and was adamant that no indemnity should be imposed upon Germany.


title: World War I reparations

text: The Paris Peace Conference opened on 18 January 1919, aiming to establish a lasting peace between the Allied and Central Powers. Demanding compensation from the defeated party was a common feature of peace treaties, including the Treaty of Versailles that Germany had imposed on France in 1871. However, the financial terms of treaties signed during the peace conference were labelled reparations to distinguish them from punitive settlements usually known as indemnities. Reparations were intended for reconstruction and compensating families who had been bereaved by the war. The opening article of the reparation section of the Treaty of Versailles, Article 231, served as a legal basis for the following articles, which obliged Germany to pay compensation and limited German responsibility to civilian damages. The same article, with the signatory's name changed, was also included in the treaties signed by Germany's allies.


title: World War I reparations

text: In February 1919, Foreign Minister Count Ulrich von Brockdorff-Rantzau informed the Weimar National Assembly that Germany would have to pay reparations for the devastation caused by the war, but would not pay for actual war costs. After the drafting of the Treaty of Versailles on 7 May that year, the German and Allied delegations met and the treaty was handed over to be translated and for a response to be issued. At this meeting Brockdorff-Rantzau stated, "We know the intensity of the hatred which meets us, and we have heard the victors' passionate demand that as the vanquished we shall be made to pay, and as the guilty we shall be punished". However, he proceeded to deny that Germany was solely responsible for the war.


title: World War I reparations

text: Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles was not correctly translated. Instead of stating "... Germany accepts responsibility of Germany and her allies causing all the loss and damage ...", the German Government's edition reads, "Germany admits it, that Germany and her allies, as authors of the war, are responsible for all losses and damages ...". This resulted in a prevailing belief of humiliation among Germans; the article was seen as an injustice and there was a view that Germany had signed "away her honor". Despite the public outrage, German government officials were aware "that Germany's position on this matter was not nearly so favorable as the imperial government had led the German public to believe during the war". Politicians seeking international sympathy would continue to use the article for its propaganda value, persuading many who had not read the treaties that the article implied full war guilt. German revisionist historians who later tried to ignore the validity of the clause found a ready audience among revisionist writers in France, Britain, and the US. The objective of both the politicians and historians was to prove that Germany was not solely guilty for causing the war; if that guilt could be disproved the legal requirement to pay reparations would disappear.


title: World War I reparations

text: The Treaty of Versailles stated that a Reparation Commission would be established in 1921. This commission would consider the resources available to Germany and her capacity to pay, provide the German Government with an opportunity to be heard on the subject, and decide on the final reparation figure that Germany would be required to pay. In the interim, Germany was required to pay an equivalent of gold marks in gold, commodities, ships, securities, or other forms. The money would be used to pay Allied occupation costs and to buy food and raw materials for Germany. Article 121 of the Treaty of Neuilly acknowledged that "the resources of Bulgaria are not sufficient to enable her to make complete reparation". Therefore, the treaty required Bulgaria to pay a sum equivalent of 2.250 billion Gold francs in reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: The treaties of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Trianon, and Sèvres acknowledged that Austria, Hungary, and Turkey did not have the resources to pay reparations, and delayed the establishment of a final figure until the Reparation Commission was established. In addition, Bulgaria was required to hand over thousands of livestock to Greece, Romania, and the Serb-Croat-Slovene State "in restitution for animals taken away by Bulgaria during the war". This would not be credited towards the reparation figure. Likewise, Bulgaria had to dispatch 50,000 tons of coal a year to the Serb-Croat-Slovene State in restitution for destroyed mines. These shipments would not be credited against Bulgaria's reparation sum. Germany, Austria, and Hungary all had commitments to handover timber, ore, and livestock to the Allied Powers. They would, however, be credited for these goods.


title: World War I reparations

text: In January 1921, the Allied Powers grew impatient and established the reparation sum at 226 billion gold marks. The Germans countered with an offer of 30 billion. On 24 April 1921, the German Government wrote to the American Government expressing "her readiness to acknowledge for reparation purposes a total liability of 50 billion gold marks", but was also prepared "to pay the equivalent of this sum in annuities adapted to her economic capacity totalling 200 billion gold marks". In addition, the German Government stated that "to accelerate the redemption of the balance" and "to combat misery and hatred created by the war", Germany was willing to provide the resources needed and "to undertake herself the rebuilding of townships, villages, and hamlets".


title: World War I reparations

text: The London Schedule of Payments of 5 May 1921 established "the full liability of all the Central Powers combined, not just Germany alone," at gold marks. This sum was a compromise promoted by Belgiumagainst higher figures demanded by the French and Italians and the lower figure the British supportedthat "represented an assessment of the lowest amount that public opinion ... would tolerate".


title: World War I reparations

text: This figure was divided into three series of bonds: "A" and "B" Bonds together had a nominal value of gold marks less than the sum Germany had previously offered to pay. "C" Bonds, comprising the remainder of the reparation figure, "were deliberately designed to be chimerical." They were "a political bargaining chip" that served the domestic policies of France and the United Kingdom. The figure was completely unreal; its primary function was to mislead public opinion "into believing that the 132-billion-mark figure was being maintained". Furthermore, "Allied experts knew that Germany could not pay 132 billion marks and that the other Central Powers could pay little. Thus, the A and B Bonds, which were genuine, represented the actual Allied assessment of German capacity to pay." Taking into account the sum already paid between 1919 and 1921, Germany's immediate obligation was 41 billion gold marks.


title: World War I reparations

text: To pay towards this sum, Germany could pay in kind or in cash. Commodities paid in kind included coal, timber, chemical dyes, pharmaceuticals, livestock, agricultural machines, construction materials, and factory machinery. The gold value of these would be deducted from what Germany was required to pay. Germany's assistance with the restoration of the university library of Louvain, which was destroyed by the Germans on 25 August 1914, was also credited towards the sum, as were some of the territorial changes the treaty imposed upon Germany. The payment schedule required within twenty-five days and then annually, plus 26 per cent of the value of German exports. The German Government was to issue bonds at five per cent interest and set up a sinking fund of one per cent to support the payment of reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: Between the signing of the Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine and April 1922, Bulgaria paid 173 million gold francs in reparations. In 1923, the Bulgarian reparation sum was revised downwards to 550 million gold francs, "plus a lump sum payment of 25 million francs for occupation costs". Towards this figure, Bulgaria paid 41 million gold francs between 1925 and 1929. In 1932, the Bulgarian reparation obligation was abandoned following the Lausanne Conference.


title: World War I reparations

text: Because Austria was "so impoverished" after the war, and because of the collapse of the Bank of Vienna, the country paid no reparations "beyond credits for transferred property". Likewise, Hungary paid no reparations beyond coal deliveries because of the collapse of the Hungarian economy. Turkish reparations had been "sharply limited in view of the magnitude of Turkish territorial losses". However, the Treaty of Sèvres was never ratified. When the Treaty of Lausanne was signed in 1923, Turkish reparations were "eliminated altogether".


title: World War I reparations

text: From the initiation of reparations, German coal deliveries were below the level agreed. In an attempt to rectify this situation, the Spa Conference was held in July 1920. At this conference it was decided that Germany would be paid five marks per coal ton delivered to facilitate coal shipments and help feed the miners. Despite this, Germany continued to default on her obligations. By late 1922, the German defaults on payments had grown so serious and regular that a crisis engulfed the Reparations Commission. French and Belgian delegates urged the seizure of the Ruhr to encourage the Germans to make more effort to pay, while the British supported postponing payments to facilitate the financial reconstruction of Germany. On 26 December 1922, Germany defaulted on timber deliveries. The timber quota was based upon a German proposal and the default was massive. The Allies were unanimous that the default was in bad faith. In January 1923, despite quota reductions, the German Government defaulted on coal deliveries for the 34th time in three years following the loss of the Upper Silesian coal fields containing 11 per cent of German coal resources, which had been transferred to Poland.


title: World War I reparations

text: On 9 January 1923, the Reparation Commission declared Germany to be in default of her coal deliveries and voted to occupy the Ruhr to enforce the country's reparation commitments. Britain was the lone dissenting voice to both measures. On 11 January, French and Belgian soldierssupported by engineers including an Italian contingententered the region, initiating the Occupation of the Ruhr.


title: World War I reparations

text: The French Premier Raymond Poincaré was deeply reluctant to order the occupation and had only taken this step after the British had rejected his proposals for more moderate sanctions against Germany. By December 1922, Poincaré was faced with Anglo-American-German hostility; coal supplies for French steel production were running low. Exasperated with Britain's failure to act, he wrote to the French ambassador in London:


title: World War I reparations

text: Judging others by themselves, the English, who are blinded by their loyalty, have always thought that the Germans did not abide by their pledges inscribed in the Versailles Treaty because they had not frankly agreed to them ... We, on the contrary, believe that if Germany, far from making the slightest effort to carry out the treaty of peace, has always tried to escape her obligations, it is because until now she has not been convinced of her defeat ... We are also certain that Germany, as a nation, resigns herself to keep her pledged word only under the impact of necessity.


title: World War I reparations

text: The occupation proved marginally profitable; the occupying powers received 900 million gold marks, and much of this merely covered the military costs of occupation. However, the real issue behind the occupation was not German defaults on coal and timber deliveries, but the forcing of Germany "to acknowledge her defeat in World War I and to accept the Versailles Treaty". Poincaré recognized that if Germany could get away with defying Versailles in regard to the reparations, a precedent would be created and inevitably the Germans would proceed to dismantle the rest of the Versailles treaty.


title: World War I reparations

text: Although the French succeeded in their objective during the Ruhr occupation, the Germans had wrecked their economy by funding passive resistance and brought about hyperinflation. Under Anglo-American pressure and simultaneous decline in the value of the franc, France was increasingly isolated and her diplomatic position was weakened. In October 1923, a committee consisting of American, Belgian, British, French, German, and Italian experts and chaired by the former Director of the US Bureau of the Budget Charles G. Dawes was formed, to consider "from a purely technical standpoint", how to balance the German budget, stabilize the economy and set an achievable level of reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: In April 1924, the Dawes Plan was accepted and it replaced the London schedule of payment. While the "C" Bonds were omitted from the plan's framework, they were not formally rescinded. French troops were to withdraw from the Ruhr, and a bank independent of the German Government, with a ruling body at least , was to be established and the German currency was to be stabilized. The payment of reparations was also reorganized. In the first year following the implementation of the plan, Germany would have to pay marks. This figure would rise to marks per year by the fifth year of the plan. A Reparations Agency was established with Allied representatives to organize the payment of reparations. Furthermore, a loan of marks was to be raisedover 50 per cent coming from the United States, 25 per cent from Britain, and the balance from other European nationsto back the German currency and to aid in the payment of reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: The adoption of the plan was followed by the Locarno Treaties. The subsequent "spirit of Locarno" saw an apparent reconciliation between the European Powers. The implementation of the Dawes Plan also saw a positive economic impact in Europe, largely funded by American loans. Under the Dawes Plan, Germany always met her obligations. However, German long-term goals remained the same despite the apparent reconciliation: the revision of the Treaty of Versailles to end reparations. The Dawes Plan was seen only a temporary measure, with expected future revisions. In late 1927, the Agent-General for Reparations "called for a more permanent scheme" for payments and in 1928 the Germans followed suit. German Foreign Minister Gustav Stresemann called for a final reparation plan to be established alongside an early withdrawal of Allied troops from the Rhineland. The French, aware of their weakening political and financial position, acquiesced. On 16 September 1928, a joint Entente-German statement acknowledging the need for a new reparation plan was issued.


title: World War I reparations

text: In February 1929, a new committee was formed to re-examine reparations. It was chaired by the American banker Owen D. Young and presented its findings in June 1929. The "Young Plan" was accepted and was ratified by the German Government on 12 March 1930. The plan established a theoretical final reparation figure at 112 billion gold marks , with a new payment schedule that would see reparations completed by 1988the first time a final date had been set. In addition, foreign oversight of German finances was to end with the withdrawal of the Reparations Agency, which would be replaced by the Bank for International Settlements. The bank was established to provide cooperation among central banks and to receive and disburse reparation payments. A further loan of was to be raised and given to Germany.


title: World War I reparations

text: As a result of the plan, German payments were half the sum required under the Dawes Plan. The implementation of the Young Plan required the Anglo-French withdrawal from the Rhineland within months. Despite the reduction, there was increasing German hostility to the plan. For example, the Law against the Enslavement of the German People, or Freedom Law, was proposed by the nationalist politician Alfred Hugenberg. Hugenberg's proposed law called for the end of the Ruhr occupation, the official renouncement of the Article 231 and the rejection of the Young Plan. While politicians rejected it, it attracted enough support from voters in order to put up for a referendum. The plebiscite was held in December 1929, resulting in 5.8 million people out of 6.3 million voters, voting in favor for the law. This fell below the required 21 million votes in order for it to take effect. While this was a political defeat for Hugenberg, it did result in significant national attention for Adolf Hitler and subsequently valuable right-wing financing.


title: World War I reparations

text: In March 1930, the German Government collapsed and was replaced by a new coalition led by Chancellor Heinrich Brüning. In June, Allied troops withdrew from near Mainzthe last occupation zone in the Rhinelandand Brüning's Government broached the subject of demanding further refinement to reparations, but this demand was refused by William Tyrrell, the British ambassador to France. During 1931, a financial crisis began in Germany. In May, Creditanstaltthe largest bank in Austriacollapsed, sparking a banking crisis in Germany and Austria. In response, Brüning announced that Germany was suspending reparation payments. This resulted in a massive withdrawal of domestic and foreign funds from German banks. By mid-July, all German banks had closed. Until this point, France's policy had been to provide Germany with financial support to help Brüning's Government stabilize the country. Brüning, now under considerable political pressure from the far-right and President Paul von Hindenburg, was unable to make any concessions or reverse policy. As a result, Brüning was unable to borrow money from foreign or domestic sources. Further attempts to enlist British support to end reparations failed; the British said it was a joint issue with France and the United States. In early July, Brüning announced "his intention to seek the outright revision of the Young Plan". In light of the crisis and with the prospect of Germany being unable to repay her debts, United States President Herbert Hoover intervened. In June, Hoover publicly proposed a one-year moratorium to reparation and war debts. By July, the "Hoover Moratorium" had been accepted.


title: World War I reparations

text: The moratorium was widely supported in both Germany and the United Kingdom. The French, initially hesitant, eventually agreed to support the American proposal. However, on 13 July, the German Darmstädter Bank collapsed, leading to further bankruptcies and a rise in unemployment further exacerbating Germany's financial crisis. With the Great Depression now exerting its influence, the Bank for International Settlements reported that the Young Plan was unrealistic in light of the economic crisis and urged the world governments to reach a new settlement on the various debts they owed each other. During January 1932, Brüning said he would seek the complete cancellation of reparations. His position was supported by the British and Italians, and opposed by the French.


title: World War I reparations

text: Because of the political differences between countries on the subject and impending elections in France and Germany, a conference could not be established until June. This delay brought about the downfall of Brüning's Government. On 16 June, the Lausanne Conference opened. However, discussions were complicated by the ongoing World Disarmament Conference. At the latter conference, the US informed the British and French that they would not be allowed to default on their war debts. In turn, they recommended that war debts be tied into German reparation payments, to which the Germans objected. On 9 July, an agreement was reached and signed. The Lausanne Conference annulled the Young Plan and required Germany to pay a final, single installment of 3 billion marks, saving France from political humiliation and ending Germany's obligation to pay reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: The precise figure Germany paid is a matter of dispute. The German Government estimated it had paid the equivalent of 67.8 billion gold marks in reparations. The German figure includedother than gold or goods in kindthe scuttling of the German fleet at Scapa Flow, state property lost in lands ceded to other countries, and the loss of colonial territories. The Reparation Commission and the Bank for International Settlements state that gold marks was paid by Germany in reparations, of which was paid before the implementation of the London Schedule of Payments. Niall Ferguson provides a slightly lower figure. He estimates that Germany paid no more than gold marks. Ferguson further estimates that this sum amounted to 2.4 per cent of Germany's national income between 1919 and 1932. Stephen Schuker, in his comprehensive econometric study, concedes that Germany transferred 16.8 billion marks over the whole period, but points out that this sum was vastly offset by the devaluation of Allied paper-mark deposits up to 1923, and by loans that Germany subsequently repudiated after 1924. The net capital transfer into Germany amounted to 17.75 billion marks, or 2.1% of Germany's entire national income over the period 1919–1931. In effect, America paid Germany four times more, in price-adjusted terms, than the U.S. furnished to West Germany under the post-1948 Marshall Plan. According to Gerhard Weinberg, reparations were paid, towns were rebuilt, orchards replanted, mines reopened and pensions paid. However, the burden of repairs was shifted away from the German economy and onto the damaged economies of the war's victors. Hans Mommsen wrote "Germany financed its reparation payments to Western creditor nations with American loans", which the British and French then used to "cover their long-term interest obligations and to retire their wartime debts with the United States."


title: World War I reparations

text: To help make reparations payments, Germany took out various loans during the 1920s. In 1933, following the cancellation of reparations, the new German Chancellor Adolf Hitler cancelled all payments. In June 1953, an agreement was reached on this existing debt with West Germany. Germany agreed to repay 50 per cent of the loan amounts that had been defaulted on in the 1920s, but deferred some of the debt until West and East Germany were unified. In 1995, following reunification, Germany began making the final payments towards the loans. A final installment of was made on 3 October 2010, settling German loan debts in regard to reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: During the period of reparations, Germany received between 27 and 38 billion marks in loans. By 1931, German foreign debt stood at 21.514 billion marks; the main sources of aid were the United States, Britain, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. Detlev Peukert argued the financial problems that arose in the early 1920s, were a result of post-war loans and the way Germany funded her war effort, and not the result of reparations. During the First World War, Germany did not raise taxes or create new ones to pay for war-time expenses. Rather, loans were taken out, placing Germany in an economically precarious position as more money entered circulation, destroying the link between paper money and the gold reserve that had been maintained before the war. With its defeat, Germany could not impose reparations and pay off her war debts now, which were now colossal.


title: World War I reparations

text: Historian Niall Ferguson partially supports this analysis: had reparations not been imposed, Germany would still have had significant problems caused by the need to pay war debts and the demands of voters for more social services. Ferguson argued that these problems were aggravated by a trade deficit and a weak exchange rate for the mark during 1920. Afterwards, as the value of the mark rose, inflation became a problem. None of these were the result of reparations. According to Ferguson, even without reparations total public spending in Germany between 1920 and 1923 was 33 per cent of total net national product. A.J.P. Taylor wrote "Germany was a net gainer by the financial transactions of the nineteen-twenties: she borrowed far more from private American investors ... than she paid in reparations". P.M.H. Bell stated the creation of a multi-national committee, which resulted in the Dawes Plan, was done to consider ways the German budget could be balanced, the currency stabilized, and the German economy fixed to ease reparation payments. Max Winkler wrote that from 1924 onward, German officials were "virtually flooded with loan offers by foreigners". Overall, the German economy performed reasonably well until the foreign investments funding the economy and the loans funding reparations payments were suddenly withdrawn after the 1929 Stock Market Crash. This collapse was magnified by the volume of loans provided to German companies by US lenders. Even the reduced payments of the Dawes Plan were mainly financed through a large volume of international loans.


title: World War I reparations

text: While Germany initially had a trade deficit, British policy during the early 1920s was to reintegrate Germany into European trade as soon as possible. Likewise, France attempted to secure trade deals with Germany. During the mid-to-late 1920s, trade between France and Germany grew rapidly. French imports of German goods "increased by 60 per cent", highlighting the close links between French industrial growth and German production, and the increase in cooperation between the countries.


title: World War I reparations

text: Max Hantke and Mark Spoerer provide a different perspective on the effect of reparations on the German economy. They wrote that focusing on the reparations and inflation ignores "the fact that the restriction of the German military to 115,000 men relieved the German central budget considerably". Hantke and Spoerer argue that their findings show "that even under quite rigorous assumptions the net economic burden of the Treaty of Versailles was much less heavy than has been hitherto thought, in particular if we confine our perspective to the Reich's budget". They say, "though politically a humiliation", the limitation on the military "was beneficial in fiscal terms" and that their economic models show that "the restriction of the size of the army was clearly beneficial for the Reich budget". Additionally, their economic scenarios indicate that while the Treaty of Versailles was "overall clearly a burden on the German economy", it "also offered a substantial peace dividend for Weimar's non-revanchist budget politicians." They conclude that, "The fact that [these politicians] did not make sufficient use of this imposed gift supports the hypothesis that the Weimar Republic suffered from home-made political failure".


title: World War I reparations

text: Erik Goldstein wrote that in 1921, the payment of reparations caused a crisis and that the occupation of the Ruhr had a disastrous effect on the German economy, resulting in the German Government printing more money as the currency collapsed. Hyperinflation began and printing presses worked overtime to print Reichsbank notes; by November 1923 one US dollar was worth Ferguson writes that the policy of the Economics Minister Robert Schmidt led Germany to avoid economic collapse from 1919 to 1920, but that reparations accounted for most of Germany's deficit in 1921 and 1922 and that reparations were the cause of the hyperinflation.


title: World War I reparations

text: Several historians counter the argument that reparations caused the inflation and collapse of the mark. Gerhard Weinberg writes that Germany refused to pay by, and that doing so destroyed their own currency. Anthony Lentin agrees and writes that inflation was "a consequence of the war rather than of the peace" and that hyperinflation was a result of the "German government's reckless issue of paper money" during the Allied occupation of the Ruhr. British and French experts believed that the Mark was being sabotaged to avoid budgetary and currency reform and to evade reparations. Sally Marks writes that the Germans claimed that reparations destroyed the Mark. Marks writes that historians who say reparations caused hyperinflation have overlooked "that the inflation long predated reparations" and the way "inflation mushroomed" between mid-1921 and the end of 1922 "when Germany was actually paying very little in reparations" and have failed to explain why "the period of least inflation coincided with the period of largest reparation payments ... or why Germans claimed after 1930 that reparations were causing deflation". She writes "there is no doubt that British and French suspicions late in 1922 were sound". Marks also writes that the "astronomic inflation which ensued was a result of German policy", whereby the government paid for passive resistance in the Ruhr "from an empty exchequer" and paid off its domestic and war debts with worthless marks. Bell agrees and writes that "inflation had little direct connection with reparation payments themselves, but a great deal to do with the way the German government chose to subsidize industry and to pay the costs of passive resistance to the occupation [of the Ruhr] by extravagant use of the printing press". Bell also writes that hyperinflation was not an inevitable consequence of the Treaty of Versailles, but was among the actual results.


title: World War I reparations

text: According to historian Claude Campbell, John Maynard Keynes "set the fashion for critics of the economic aspects of the treaty" and "made probably the severest and most sweeping indictment of its economic provisions". Keynes was temporarily attached to the British Treasury during the war and was their official representative at the peace conference. He later resigned "when it became evident that hope could no longer be entertained of substantial modifications in the draft Terms of Peace" due to the "policy of the Conference towards the economic problems of Europe". In 1919, he wrote "The Economic Consequences of the Peace" based on his objections. He wrote that he believed "that the campaign for securing out of Germany the general costs of the war was one of the most serious acts of political unwisdom for which our statesmen have ever been responsible", and called the treaty a "Carthaginian peace" that would economically affect all of Europe. Keynes said that the treaty's reparation figures "generally exceed Germany's capacity" to pay. He said that was the "safe maximum figure", but even then he did "not believe that [Germany could] pay as much". He said the Reparation Commission was a tool that could "be employed to destroy Germany's commercial and economic organization as well as to exact payment".


title: World War I reparations

text: In Keynes' opinion, the reparation figure should have been fixed "well within Germany's capacity to pay" so to "make possible the renewal of hope and enterprise within her territory" and to "avoid the perpetual friction and opportunity of improper pressure arising out of the Treaty clauses". Keynes identified reparations as the "main excursion into the economic field" by the Treaty of Versailles, but said that the treaty excluded provisions for rehabilitating Europe's economies, for improving relations between the Allies and the defeated Central Powers, for stabilizing Europe's new nations, for "reclaim[ing] Russia", or for promoting economic solidarity between the Allies. Coal provides an example of these destabilizing effects in Germany and beyond. Keynes said the "surrender of the coal will destroy German industry" but conceding that without coal shipments as reparations, the French and Italian industries damaged directly by the war or indirectly by damage to coal mines would be affected. He writes that this is "not yet the whole problem". The repercussions would also affect Central and Northern Europe, and neutral states such as Switzerland and Sweden, which made up for their own coal deficiencies by trading with Germany. Likewise, Keynes said Austria would now be consigned to "industrial ruin" as "nearly all the coalfields of the former Empire lie outside of what is now German-Austria".


title: World War I reparations

text: Campbell writes that the "apparent majority did not regard the treaty as perfect". Bernard Baruch writes in "The Making of the Reparation and Economic Sections of the Treaty" that most believed it to be the best agreement obtainable under the circumstances and that it was a minority that attacked the treaty, but these attacks "centered upon its economic provisions". James T. Shotwell, writing in "What Germany Forgot", said, "the only 'unendurable servitudes' in the treaty were in the sections on Reparation and the Polish settlement and raised the question as to what part of Germany's grievance against the peace lay in the substance of its exactions and what part in the manner of their imposition". Sir Andrew McFayden, who also represented the British Treasury at the peace conference and later worked with the Reparation Commission, published his work "Don't Do it Again". McFayden's position "falls somewhere between the views of Keynes and Shotwell". His attack on reparations "was as harsh as Keynes" but he conceded that the "fault did not lie primarily in the provisions of the treaty but in their execution". He also believed "that the Polish settlement was the only readjustment ... which was decidedly unwise".


title: World War I reparations

text: Albrecht-Carrié writes that before the German surrender, Woodrow Wilson dispatched a note to the German Government on 5 November 1918 stating that the Allies "under-stand that compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and their property by the aggression of Germany by land, by sea, and from the air", the terms of which they accepted. Regardless of which, Albrecht-Carrié says the reparation section of the treaty proved "to be a dismal failure". Campbell says, "although there was much in the peace that was 'petty, unjust, and humiliating', there was little aside from reparation clauses and certain territorial concessions, which had much real bearing upon Germany's economic future". Summarizing the view of economists throughout the 1920s, she says the territorial changes to Germany were "not necessarily ... economically unsound", but than the removal of the Saar and territory to Poland "depriv[ed] Germany of her resources in excess of the amount necessary to fulfill the legitimate economic demands of the victors ... [and] was indefensible". Campbell also said the treaty failed to include "provisions looking to the restoration of Germany to her former position as the chief economic and financial stabilizing influence in central Europe" and that this was economically shortsighted and was an economic failing of the treaty.


title: World War I reparations

text: Étienne Mantoux, a French economist, was the harshest contemporaneous critic of Keynes. In his posthumously published book, "The Carthaginian Peace, or the Economic Consequences of Mr. Keynes", Mantoux said that Keynes "had been wrong on various counts, especially with respect to his predictions about Germany's coal, iron and steel production ... and its level of national saving". Keynes said Europe's overall output of iron would decrease; Mantoux said the opposite occurred. By 1929, European iron output had increased by ten per cent from that of 1913. Keynes believed that this European trend would also affect German iron and steel production. Mantoux says this prediction was also incorrect. By 1927, German steel output had increased by 30 per cent and iron output increased by 38 per cent from 1913. Keynes predicted that German coal extraction would also decrease and that Germany would not be able to export coal immediately after the war. Mantoux also counters these arguments. By 1920, German was exporting 15 million tons of coal a year and reached 35 million tons by 1926. By 1929, German coal mining had risen by 30 per cent on the 1913 figures because of her increased labor efficiency methods. In regard to national savings, Keynes stated that 2 billion marks would only be possible after the adoption of the treaty. Mantoux says that the 1925 German national savings figure was estimated at 6.4 billion marks, rising to 7.6 billion marks by 1927. Mantoux calculated that Germany borrowed between 8 billion and 35 billion marks in the period 1920–1931, while only paying 21 billion in reparations. This, he says, allowed Germany to re-equip, expand, and modernize her industry. Highlighting the rearmament under Hitler, Mantoux said Germany "had been in a stronger position to pay reparations than Keynes had made out". He also says that Germany could have paid all of the reparations if she had wanted to, and that the problem was not that Germany was unable to pay, but that she was unwilling to pay.


title: World War I reparations

text: In 1954, United States Secretary of State John Foster Dullesone of the authors of Article 231said that, "Efforts to bankrupt and humiliate a nation merely incite a people of vigor and of courage to break the bonds imposed upon them ... Prohibitions thus incite the very acts that are prohibited."


title: World War I reparations

text: Geoff Harcourt writes that Keynes' arguments that reparations would lead to German economic collapse have been adopted "by historians of almost all political persuasions" and have influenced the way historians and the public "see the unfolding events in Germany and the decades between Versailles and the outbreak of the Second World War". He says Mantoux's work "is not simply a critique of Keynes", but "a stimulus to question the received wisdom's interpretation of the unfolding events in Germany". Harcourt says that despite it discussing Keynes' errors "in great detail", Mantoux's work "has not led us to revise our general judgment of Keynes", yet "it does make us question the soundness of theoretical and empirical aspects" of his arguments. A.J.P. Taylor writes that in 1919 "many people believed that the payment of reparations would reduce Germany to a state of Asiatic poverty", and that Keynes "held this view, as did all Germans; and probably many Frenchmen". However, he also says these "apprehensions of Keynes and the Germans were grotesquely exaggerated".


title: World War I reparations

text: According to Martel, Taylor "shrewdly concludes that Étienne Mantoux had the better of his controversy with John Maynard Keynes". Stephen Schuker writes that Keynes' "tendentious but influential" book was "ably refuted" by Mantoux. Richard J. Evans says "the economic history of the 1920s and early 1930s seemed to confirm" the arguments of Keynes, yet "as we now know" Keynes' reparation arguments were wrong. Evans says the economic problems that arose were a result of the inflation of 1923, which lay with the German government rather than reparations.


title: World War I reparations

text: According to Slavieck, the "traditional interpretation of the treaty's impact on Germany" was that it "plunged the nation into an economic free fall". This view was shared by the German people, who believed the treaty was robbing Germany of its wealth. German banker Max Warburg said the terms of the treaty were "pillage on a global scale". Niall Ferguson says the German view was incorrect and "not many historians would today agree with Warburg". However, several historians agree with Warburg. Norman Davies writes that the treaty forced Germany to "pay astronomic reparations", while Tim McNeese states, "France and Britain had placed war damages on Germany to the tune of billions of gold marks, which the defeated Germans could not begin to pay in earnest". Ferguson says the reparations were "less of a burden than Keynes and others claimed" and that the "potential burden on national income of the annuity vary from 5 percent to 10 percent". However, he cautions against underestimating the initial German effort to pay. Before the implementation of the Dawes Plan, Germany transferred between eight and 13 billion gold marks, which amounted to "between 4 and 7 percent of total national income". Ferguson says "the annuity demanded in 1921 put an intolerable strain on the state's finances" and that total expenditure between 1920 and 1923 amounted to "at least 50 percent of Reich revenue, 20 percent of total Reich spending and 10 percent of total public spending". Thus, Ferguson says, reparations "undermined confidence in the Reich's creditworthiness" and ""were" therefore excessiveas the German government claimed".


title: World War I reparations

text: Hantke and Spoerer write that "reparation payments were indeed a severe economic burden for Germany" and that "the German economy was deprived of between one and 2.2 billion Reichsmark (RM) annually, which amounted in the late 1920s to nearly 2.5 per cent of Germany's GDP". Gerald Feldman writes, "there can be no question that the entire London schedule could be viewed as a way of reducing the reparations bill without the Allied publics being fully informed of what was going on. This was recognized by at least some German politicians, one of whom optimistically argued that 'the entente will only demand the 50 billion marks, not the rest. They have only called for the rest for domestic political reasons.'" Feldman also says the prospect that the 'C' bonds would be evoked hung over the German Government like a "Damocles Sword". In addition to Feldman and Ferguson's opposition, Peter Kruger, Barry Eichengreen, and Steven Webb agree that "the initial German effort to pay reparations" was substantial and "produced an immense strain" on the German economy.


title: World War I reparations

text: Several historians take the middle ground between condemning reparations and supporting the argument that they were not a complete burden upon Germany. Detlev Peukert states, "Reparations did not, in fact, bleed the German economy" as had been feared, however the "psychological effects of reparations were extremely serious, as was the strain that the vicious circle of credits and reparations placed the international financial system". P.M.H. Bell writes that while reparations were unwelcome in Germany and caused a "strain on the German balance of payments", they could be paid and were "compatible with a general recovery in European commerce and industry". According to Martel, Robert Boyce said reparations were "a heavy burden on Germany, both as a financial charge ... and as a charge on Germany's balance of payments". However, he says that while "Germany claimed it could not afford to pay reparations" this was far from the truth, and that " ... Germany had made little effort to pay reparations. It refused to levy the necessary taxes, and far from accumulating the foreign exchange required for their payment by collecting some of the overseas earnings of German exporters, it allowed them to leave their earnings abroad". William R. Keylor agrees with Boyce, and says, "an increase in taxation and reduction in consumption in the Weimar Republic would have yielded the requisite export surplus to generate the foreign exchange needed to service the reparation debt". However, Charles Feinstein writes that these kind of arguments overlook the extreme reluctance of the Germans "to accept even a modest increase in taxation to meet what was universally regarded as an unjustified and oppressive imposition by hostile adversaries". Feinstein says that "even if the economic aspects ... were not as crippling as had been assumed in the 1920s, the exaction of reparations was still of deep political and psychological significance for Germany".


title: World War I reparations

text: Sally Marks writes, "There are those ... who claim reparations were unpayable. In financial terms, that is untrue ... Of course Germans did not want to pay; nobody ever wants to pay, and Weimar was determined not to do so ... Raising taxes would have provided ample funds ... Weimar could have borrowed from the citizenry, as France did after 1871 [to pay its indemnity to Germany]". Marks writes that Germany could have easily paid the 50 billion marks in reparations, but instead chose to repeatedly default on payments as part of a political strategy of undermining Versailles. Marks says that in 1921, Germany met her requirements in full because custom posts were occupied by Allied troops. Once the Allies had relinquished control of the customs posts, Germany made no further payments in cash until 1924 following the implementation of the Dawes Plan. Marks says that while Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles "established an unlimited theoretical liability", Article 232 limited German responsibility to pay only for civilian damages. When the 1921 London conference to determine how much Germany should pay was called, the Allies calculated on the basis of what Germany could pay, not on their own needs. In this way, Marks says, the Germans largely escaped paying for the war and instead shifted the costs onto American investors. Marks states that the delay in establishing a final total until 1921, "was actually in Germany's interest" because the figures discussed at the peace conference were "astronomic". She says, "The British experts, Lords Sumner and Cunliffe, were so unrealistic that they were nicknamed 'the heavenly twins'." Marks also says, "much ink has been wasted on the fact that civilian damages were stretched to cover war widows' pensions and allowances for military dependents". As reparations were based on what Germany could pay, Marks says the inclusion of such items did not affect German liability but altered distribution of reparations; the "inclusion of pensions and allowances increased the British share of the pie but did not enlarge the pie."


title: World War I reparations

text: Bernadotte Schmitt writes that if "pensions and separation allowances ... not been included, reparations would probably never have become the bogey that poisoned the post-war world for so many years. Taylor says, "no doubt the impoverishment of Germany was caused by war, not by reparations. Not doubt the Germans could have paid reparations, if they had regarded them as an obligation of honour, honestly incurred." However, he says, "reparations  ... kept the passions of war alive". Peter Liberman writes that while the Germans believed they could not meet such demands of them, the "French believed that Germany could pay and only lacked the requisite will" to do so. Liberman says this is "a position that has gained support from recent historical research". In regard to Germany's capacity to pay, he focuses on coal and says that German coal consumption per capita was higher than France's despite coal shipments being consistently short. He also says, "the reparations demanded at Versailles were not far out of proportion to German economic potential" and that in terms of national income it was similar to what the Germans demanded of France following the Franco-Prussian War. Martin Kitchen also says the impression that Germany was crippled by the reparations is a myth. Rather than a weakened Germany, he states the opposite was true.


title: World War I reparations

text: Keylor says that literature on reparations has "long suffered from gross misrepresentation, exaggeration, and outright falsification" and that it "should finally succumb to the archive-based discoveries of scholars". Diane Kunz, summarizing the historiography on the subject, writes that historians have refuted the myth that reparations placed an intolerable burden on Germany. Marks says a "substantial degree of scholarly consensus now suggests that paying ... was within Germany's financial capacity". Ruth Henig writes, "most historians of the Paris peace conference now take the view that, in economic terms, the treaty was not unduly harsh on Germany and that, while obligations and damages were inevitably much stressed in the debates at Paris to satisfy electors reading the daily newspapers, the intention was quietly to give Germany substantial help towards paying her bills, and to meet many of the German objections by amendments to the way the reparations schedule was in practice carried out".


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The , branded as the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games, was an international multi-sport parasports event held from 24 August to 5 September 2021 in Tokyo, Japan. They were the 16th Summer Paralympic Games as organized by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC).


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: Originally scheduled to take place from 25 August to 6 September 2020, both the 2020 Summer Olympics and Paralympics were postponed by a year in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the rescheduled Games still referred to as "Tokyo 2020" for marketing and branding purposes. As with the Olympics, the Games were largely held behind closed doors with no outside spectators due to a state of emergency in the Greater Tokyo Area and other prefectures. The Games were the second Summer Paralympics hosted by Tokyo since 1964, and the third Paralympics held in Japan overall since the 1998 Winter Paralympics in Nagano. Due to the postponement of the Paralympics because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was also the first (and only) Paralympic Games to be held in an odd-numbered year and the first Summer Paralympics to be held in a non-leap year.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The Games featured 539 medal events in 22 sports, with badminton and taekwondo both making their Paralympic debut to replace football 7-a-side and sailing. China topped the medal table for the fifth consecutive Paralympics, with 96 golds and 207 total medals. Great Britain finished second for the ninth time, with 41 golds and 124 total medals. The United States finished third, with 37 golds, their best finish since the 2008 games, and 104 total medals. The Russian Paralympic Committee finished fourth, with a total of 36 golds and 118 total medals, putting them in third place when ranked by total medals.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The host of the 2020 Summer Olympics would also host the 2020 Summer Paralympics, according to a 2001 agreement between the International Paralympic Committee and the International Olympic Committee. At the 125th IOC Session, Tokyo was awarded the 2020 Summer Olympics and Paralympics via a tie-breaker in the second round of voting.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: Ahead of the 2016 Summer Paralympics closing ceremony, Governor of Tokyo Yuriko Koike advocated for the city to improve its accessibility as a legacy project for the Games. She cited narrow roadways with no sidewalks, buildings constructed with narrow doorways, and low ceilings, as challenges that needed to be overcome. In particular, she called for a transition to underground power lines to facilitate the widening of roads.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: A number of Toyota e-Palette self-driving vehicles had been adapted to provide transport to athletes in the Paralympic Games village. On 27 August, however, the use of the vehicles was suspended after one collided with an athlete before all vehicles were re-used 3 days later.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: In September 2018, applications to be volunteers at the Olympic and Paralympic Games were released. By January 2019 186,101 applications had been received. Interviews to whittle the numbers down began in February 2019 and training taking place in October 2019. The volunteers at the venues were known as "Field Cast" and the volunteers in the city were known as "City Cast". These names were chosen from a shortlist of four out of an original 149 pairs of names. The other shortlisted names were "Shining Blue and Shining Blue Tokyo", "Games Anchor and City Anchor" and "Games Force and City Force". The names were chosen by the people who had applied to be volunteers at the games.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The designs of the medals for the 2020 Summer Paralympics were unveiled on 25 August 2019; as with the Olympic medals, they are constructed using recycled metals that were obtained through an electronics recycling programme. The medals feature a design inspired by traditional folding hand fans to symbolise the shared experience of the Paralympics; alternating sectors containing textured areas visually and tactually depict flowers, leaves, rocks, water and wood to symbolise the geology of Japan. The pivot where the fan meets is stated to symbolise the unity of Paralympic athletes. The obverse of the medal contains an untextured version of the fan pattern, the Paralympic emblem, and inscriptions in braille. To aid those with visual impairments, the edges and ribbons of the medals contain one, two, or three circular indentations and silicone convex dots for gold, silver, and bronze medals respectively so that they can be easily identified by touch.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The 2020 Summer Olympics were largely held behind closed doors due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan, and a state of emergency in Tokyo issued by Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, though events in some regions could be held with up to 10,000 spectators or 50% capacity (whichever is smaller) if they were not subject to a state of emergency. The declaration was originally in effect from 12 July through 22 August 2021 (two days before the Paralympic opening ceremony); on 2 August, citing worsening rates of infection, Suga announced that the existing state of emergency would be extended through 31 August, and expanded to several other prefectures (including three that neighbour Tokyo).


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: New daily cases in Tokyo reached over 4,000 by 11 August 2021; it was anticipated that no public spectators would be admitted during the Paralympics in Tokyo and other affected regions, as with the Olympics. Organizers discussed other options for some form of spectator presence, such as inviting local school students to attend events (a program which was also employed during the Olympics, and largely scaled back due to the pandemic). It was later confirmed that there would be no public spectators at venues in the Tokyo, Chiba, and Saitama prefectures. On 19 August, the state of emergency was extended through 12 September 2021, and expanded to include Shizuoka.


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: On 20 August 2021, Tokyo Organizing Committee delivery officer Hidemasa Nakamura stated that the biosecurity protocols for the Paralympics had been expanded upon those from the Olympics due to the increased vulnerability to COVID-19 among its athletes, but that Tokyo was facing deteriorating hospital capacity, and that "It’s a fight against time so we need to make sure that sufficient communication is taken at a speedy manner." Paula Tesoriero of the New Zealand delegation stated that the Tokyo Organizing Committee and IPC had "worked tirelessly to create the safest and secure environment possible with a focus on continuing to stay vigilant".


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: On 4 September, after four consecutive days without any new COVID-19 cases within the Paralympic bubble, the IPC commended the Tokyo Organizing Committee for their work in handling the pandemic, with a spokesperson stating that "the amount of work that has gone in behind the scenes to deliver what you have seen over the past three weeks has been phenomenal."


title: 2020 Summer Paralympics

text: The details of the torch relay route were announced on 21 November 2019. There was a Heritage Flame Celebration that was held in Stoke Mandeville. and flame lighting festivals that took place in 43 of Japan's 47 prefectures between 13 and 17 August 2020. In the second phase of the relay, another 4 rituals were performed in the 3 other prefectures that were jointly hosting the events with Tokyo between 18 to 20 August throughout the three prefectures that co-hosted Paralympic events during the run-up to the Paralympic Opening Ceremony and the last day the Tokyo Prefecture torch was lit. The flames from each of the flame lighting festivals hosted in each prefecture were brought together in Tokyo.On the night of August 21st,at the front of the Akasaka Palace all the 48 flames were unified and the third and last phase of the relay began and lasted 4 days. This rote was the same used for the last legs of the 2020 Summer Olympics torch relay.