title: Plastic explosive

text: Plastic explosives are especially suited for explosive demolition of obstacles and fortifications by engineers, combat engineers and criminals as they can be easily formed into the best shapes for cutting structural members and have a high enough velocity of detonation and density for metal cutting work.


title: Plastic explosive

text: An early use of plastic explosives was in the warhead of the Petard demolition mortar of the British Armoured Vehicle Royal Engineers (AVRE); said mortar was used to destroy concrete fortifications encountered during Operation Overlord (D-Day). The original use of Nobel 808 supplied by the SOE was for sabotage of German installations and railways in Occupied Europe.


title: Plastic explosive

text: They are generally not used for ordinary blasting as they tend to be significantly more expensive than other materials that perform just as well in this application. A common commercial use of plastic explosives is for shock hardening high manganese percentage steel, a material typically used for train rail components and earth digging implements.


title: Plastic explosive

text: Reactive armor in tanks uses plastic explosives sandwiched between two plates of steel. Incoming high explosive shaped charge anti-tank rounds pierce the outer steel plate, then detonate the plastic explosive. This disrupts the energy from the incoming round and shields the tank.


title: Plastic explosive

text: The first plastic explosive was gelignite, invented by Alfred Nobel in 1875. Prior to World War I, the British explosives chemist Oswald Silberrad obtained British and U.S. patents for a series of plastic explosives called "Nitrols", composed of nitrated aromatics, collodion, and oxidising inorganic salts. The language of the patents indicate that at this time, Silberrad saw no need to explain to "those versed in the art" either what he meant by plasticity or why it may be advantageous, as he only explains why his plastic explosive is superior to others of that type.


title: Plastic explosive

text: One of the simplest plastic explosives was Nobel's Explosive No. 808, also known as "Nobel 808" (often just called "Explosive 808" in the British Armed Forces during the Second World War), developed by the British company Nobel Chemicals Ltd well before World War II. It had the appearance of green plasticine with a distinctive smell of almonds. During World War II it was extensively used by the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) at Aston House for sabotage missions. It is also the explosive used in HESH anti-tank shells and was an essential factor in the devising of the Gammon grenade. Captured SOE-supplied Nobel 808 was the explosive used in the failed 20 July plot assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler in 1944.


title: Plastic explosive

text: During and after World War II a number of new RDX-based explosives were developed, including Compositions C, C2, and eventually C3. Together with RDX, these incorporate various plasticizers to decrease sensitivity and make the composition plastic. The origin of the obsolete term "plastique" dates back to the Nobel 808 explosive introduced to the U.S. by the British in 1940. The samples of explosive brought to the U.S. by the Tizard Mission had already been packaged by the SOE ready for dropping via parachute container to the French Resistance and were therefore labeled in French, as "Explosif Plastique". It is still referred to by this name in France and also by some Americans.


title: Plastic explosive

text: The British used a plastic explosive during World War II as a demolition charge. The specific explosive, Composition C, was 88.3% RDX and 11.7% non-oily, non-explosive plasticizer. The material was plastic between , but was brittle at colder temperatures and gummy at higher temperatures. Composition C was superseded by Composition C2, which used a mixture of 80% RDX and 20% plasticizer. Composition C2 had a wider temperature range at which it remained plastic, from . Composition C2 was replaced by Composition C3, which was a mixture of 77% RDX and 23% explosive plasticizer. C3 was effective but proved to be too brittle in cold weather and was replaced with C4. There are three classes of C4, with varying amounts of RDX and polyisobutylene.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Taraxacum officinale, the dandelion or common dandelion, is a flowering herbaceous perennial plant of the dandelion genus in the family Asteraceae (syn. Compositae). The common dandelion is well known for its yellow flower heads that turn into round balls of many silver-tufted fruits that disperse in the wind. These balls are usually called "clocks" in both British and American English. The name "blowball" is also used.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The common dandelion grows in temperate regions of the world in areas with moist soils. It is most often considered a weed, especially in lawns and along roadsides, but the leaves, flowers, and roots are sometimes used in herbal medicine and as food.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "Taraxacum officinale" grows from (generally unbranched) taproots and produces several hollow, leafless flower stems that are typically tall, but sometimes up to tall. The stems can be tinted purplish, they are upright or lax, and produce flower heads that are held as tall or taller than the foliage. The foliage may be upright-growing or horizontally spreading; the leaves have petioles that are either unwinged or narrowly winged. The stems can be glabrous or sparsely covered with short hairs. Plants have milky latex and the leaves are all basal; each flowering stem lacks bracts and has one single flower head. The yellow flower heads lack receptacle bracts and all the flowers, which are called florets, are ligulate and bisexual. In many lineages, fruits are mostly produced by apomixis, notwithstanding the flowers are visited by many types of insects.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The leaves are long and wide, and are oblanceolate, oblong, or obovate in shape, with the bases gradually narrowing to the petiole. The leaf margins are typically shallowly lobed to deeply lobed and often lacerate or toothed with sharp or dull teeth.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The calyculi (the cuplike bracts that hold the florets) are composed of 12 to 18 segments: each segment is reflexed and sometimes glaucous. The lanceolate shaped bractlets are in two series, with the apices acuminate in shape. The wide involucres are green to dark green or brownish-green, with the tips dark gray or purplish. The florets number 40 to over 100 per head, having corollas that are yellow or orange-yellow in color.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The fruits, called cypselae, range in color from olive-green or olive-brown to straw-colored to grayish, they are oblanceoloid in shape and long with slender beaks. The fruits have 4 to 12 ribs that have sharp edges. The silky pappi, which form the parachutes, are white to silver-white in color and around 6 mm wide. Plants typically have 24 or 40 pairs of chromosomes, while some have 16 or 32 pairs.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Taraxalisin is a serine proteinase found in the latex of dandelion roots. Rudenskaya et al. (1998) found that taraxalisin hydrolyzes a chromogenic peptide substrate Glp-Ala-Ala-Leu-pNA optimally at pH 8.0. Maximal activity of the proteinase in the roots is attained in April, at the beginning of plant development after the winter period.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Carl Linnaeus named the species "Leontodon taraxacum" in 1753. The current genus name "Taraxacum" derives possibly from the Arabic "Tharakhchakon", or from the Greek "Tarraxos". The specific name "officinalis" refers to its value as a medicinal herb, and is derived from the word "opificina", later "officina", meaning a workshop or pharmacy.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The taxonomy of the genus "Taraxacum" is complicated by apomictic and polyploid lineages, and the taxonomy and nomenclatural situation of "T. officinale" is not yet fully resolved. The taxonomy of this genus has been complicated by the recognition of numerous species, subspecies and microspecies. For example, Rothmaler's flora of Germany recognizes roughly 70 microspecies.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The plants introduced to North America are triploids that reproduce by obligate gametophytic apomixis Some authorities recognize three subspecies of "Taraxacum officinale", including:


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Two of them have been introduced and established in Alaska and the third (subsp. "ceratophorum") is native there.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "Taraxacum officinale L". (dandelion) is a vigorous weed in Europe with diploid sexual populations in the southern regions and partially overlapping populations of diploid sexuals and triploid or tetraploid apomicts in the central and northern regions.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: These European dandelions can be divided into two groups. The first group reproduces sexually, as do most seed plants. This group consists of dandelions that have a diploid set of chromosomes, and are sexually self-incompatible. Sexual reproduction involves a reduction of the somatic chromosome number by meiosis followed by a restoration of the somatic chromosome number by fertilization. Diploid dandelions have eight pairs of chromosomes, and meiosis is regular with normal pairing of homologous chromosomes at the metaphase I stage of meiosis.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The second group consists of polyploid (mostly triploid) apomicts, meaning that both a viable embryo as well as a functional endosperm is formed without prior fertilization. In contrast to the sexual diploids, the pairing of chromosomes at metaphase I in triploid apomicts is strongly reduced. However pairing is still sufficient to allow some recombination between homologous chromosomes.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "Taraxacum" is derived from the Arabic word (or ) for a bitter herb. It may be related to the Greek word ταρασσω ("tarasso") meaning to disturb.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The Latin specific epithet "officinale" refers to the Latin word for 'medicinal' or 'of the apothecaries'.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "T. officinale" has many English common names (some of which are no longer in use), including blowball, lion's-tooth, cankerwort, milk-witch, yellow-gowan, Irish daisy, monks-head, priest's-crown and puff-ball; other common names include, faceclock, pee-a-bed, wet-a-bed, swine's snout, white endive, and wild endive.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The common name "dandelion" comes from the French "dent de lion", or "lion's tooth", in reference to the plant's jagged-edged leaves.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "Taraxacum officinale" is native to Europe and Asia, and was originally imported to America as a food crop. It is now naturalized throughout North America, southern Africa, South America, New Zealand, Australia, and India. It occurs in all 50 states of the US and most Canadian provinces.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The plant grows in temperate regions of the world in lawns, on roadsides, disturbed banks, shores of waterways, and other areas with moist soils.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The plant is coveted by collectors in regions where the plant is trickier to grow such as the tropics, where people would often resort to smuggling seeds from overseas.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: It is considered a noxious weed in some jurisdictions, and is considered to be a nuisance in residential and recreational lawns in North America. It is also an important weed in agriculture and causes significant economic damage because of its infestation in many crops worldwide.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "T. officinale" can serve as an indicator plant for soil potassium and calcium, as the plant favours soils with relatively low concentrations of calcium, but favours soils with relatively high concentrations of potassium.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The dandelion is a common colonizer of disturbed habitats, both from wind blown seeds and seed germination from the seed bank. The seeds remain viable in the seed bank for many years, with one study showing germination after nine years. This species is a somewhat prolific seed producer, with 54 to 172 seeds produced per head, and a single plant can produce more than 5,000 seeds a year. It is estimated that more than 97,000,000 seeds/hectare could be produced yearly by a dense stand of dandelions. When released, the seeds can be spread by the wind up to several hundred meters from their source. The seeds are also a common contaminant in crop and forage seeds. The plants are adaptable to most soils and the seeds are not dependent on cold temperatures before they will germinate but they need to be within the top of soil.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "T. officinale" is food for the caterpillars of several Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths), such as the tortrix moth "Celypha rufana". See also List of Lepidoptera that feed on dandelions.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Even though dandelion pollen is of poor nutritional quality for honey bees, they readily consume it, and it can be an important source of nutritional diversity in heavily managed monocultures such as that of blueberries. Honey bees have not been shown to lower their pollination activity on nearby fruit crops when foraging on dandelions.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: While not in bloom, this species is sometimes confused with others, such as "Chondrilla juncea", that have similar basal rosettes of foliage. Another plant, sometimes referred to as fall dandelion, is very similar to dandelion, but produces "yellow fields" later. Its blooms resemble some of the species of "Sonchus", but are larger.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: The plant has several culinary uses: the flowers are used to make dandelion wine, the greens are used in salads, the roots have been used to make a coffee substitute (when baked and ground into powder) and the plant was used by Native Americans as a food and medicine.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Dandelions are harvested from the wild or grown on a small scale as a leaf vegetable. The leaves (called dandelion greens) can be eaten cooked or raw in various forms, such as in soup or salad. They are probably closest in character to mustard greens. Usually the young leaves and unopened buds are eaten raw in salads, while older leaves are cooked. Raw leaves have a slightly bitter taste. Dandelion salad is often accompanied with hard-boiled eggs. The leaves are high in vitamins A and C, as well as iron, phosphorus, and potassium.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Dandelion flowers can be used to make dandelion wine, for which there are many recipes. Most of these are more accurately described as "dandelion-flavored wine," as some other sort of fermented juice or extract serves as the main ingredient. It has also been used in a saison ale called Pissenlit (the French word for dandelion, literally meaning "wet the bed") made by Brasserie Fantôme in Belgium. Dandelion and burdock is a soft drink that has long been popular in the United Kingdom.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Another recipe using the plant is dandelion flower jam. In Silesia and other parts of Poland and the world, dandelion flowers are used to make a honey substitute syrup with added lemon (so-called "May-honey"). Ground roasted dandelion root can be used as a non-caffeinated coffee substitute.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: "T. officinale"'s diuretic properties - believed to be a result of the plant’s high potassium content - have been well described, with the leaves of this plant having been used for this purpose in traditional Chinese medicine for approximately 2,000 years, with other regions of the world using the plant in the same way; in French, a common name for "T. officinale" is "pissenlit", 'a colorful description of its diuretic activity.' A study conducted in 2009 noted 'promising' results regarding these diuretic properties, but that further studies would need to be conducted into the plant's efficacy.


title: Taraxacum officinale

text: Yellow dye colors can be obtained from the flowers but little color can be obtained from the roots of the plant. The latex can be used as a kind of glue.


title: The Five (composers)

text: The Five (, lit. "Mighty Bunch"), also known as the Mighty Handful, The Mighty Five, and the New Russian School, were five prominent 19th-century Russian composers who worked together to create a distinct national style of classical music: Mily Balakirev (the leader), César Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Borodin. They lived in Saint Petersburg, and collaborated from 1856 to 1870.


title: The Five (composers)

text: In May 1867 the critic Vladimir Stasov wrote an article, titled "Mr. Balakirev's Slavic Concert", covering a concert that had been performed for visiting Slav delegations at the "All-Russian Ethnographical Exhibition" in Moscow. The four Russian composers whose works were played at the concert were Mikhail Glinka, Alexander Dargomyzhsky, Mily Balakirev, and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The article ended with the following statement:


title: The Five (composers)

text: The expression "mighty handful" (, "Moguchaya kuchka", "Mighty Bunch") was mocked by enemies of Balakirev and Stasov: Aleksandr Serov, academic circles of the conservatory, the Russian Musical Society, and their press supporters. The group ignored critics and continued operating under the moniker. This loose collection of composers gathered around Balakirev now included Cui, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Borodin — the five who have come to be associated with the name "Mighty Handful", or sometimes "The Five". Gerald Abraham stated flatly in the "Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians" that "they never called themselves, nor were they ever called in Russia, 'The Five'" (although today the Russian equivalent "Пятёрка" ("Pyatyorka") is occasionally used to refer to this group). In his memoirs, Rimsky-Korsakov routinely refers to the group as "Balakirev's circle", and occasionally uses "The Mighty Handful", usually with an ironic tone. He also makes the following reference to "The Five":


title: The Five (composers)

text: The Russian word "kuchka" also spawned the terms "kuchkism" and "kuchkist", which may be applied to artistic aims or works in tune with the sensibilities of the Mighty Handful.


title: The Five (composers)

text: The name of Les Six, an even looser collection of French-speaking composers, emulates that of "The Five".


title: The Five (composers)

text: The formation of the group began in 1856 with the first meeting of Balakirev and César Cui. Modest Mussorgsky joined them in 1857, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov in 1861, and Alexander Borodin in 1862. All the composers in The Five were young men in 1862. Balakirev was 25, Cui 27, Mussorgsky 23, Borodin the eldest at 28, and Rimsky-Korsakov just 18. They were all self-trained amateurs. Borodin combined composing with a career in chemistry. Rimsky-Korsakov was a naval officer (he wrote his First Symphony on a three-year naval voyage circumnavigating the globe). Mussorgsky had been in the prestigious Preobrazhensky Regiment of the Imperial Guard, and then in the civil service before taking up music; even at the height of his career in the 1870s he was forced by the expense of his drinking habit to hold down a full-time job in the State Forestry Department.


title: The Five (composers)

text: In contrast to the élite status and court connections of Conservatory composers such as Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, The Five were mainly from the minor gentry of the provinces. To some degree their "esprit de corps" depended on the myth, which they themselves created, of a movement that was more "authentically Russian," in the sense that it was closer to the native soil, than the classic academy. Spurred on by Russian nationalist ideas, the Five “sought to capture elements of rural Russian life, to build national pride, and to prevent western ideals from seeping into their culture.”


title: The Five (composers)

text: Before them, Mikhail Glinka and Alexander Dargomyzhsky had gone some way towards producing a distinctly Russian kind of music, writing operas on Russian subjects, but the Mighty Handful represented the first concentrated attempt to develop such a music, with Stasov as their artistic adviser and Dargomyzhsky as an elder statesman to the group, so to speak. The circle began to fall apart during the 1870s, no doubt partially due to the fact that Balakirev withdrew from musical life early in the decade for a period of time. All of "The Five" are buried in Tikhvin Cemetery in Saint Petersburg.


title: The Five (composers)

text: The musical language The Five developed set them far apart from the Conservatoire. This self-conscious Russian styling was based on two elements:


title: The Five (composers)

text: One hallmark of "The Five" was its reliance on orientalism. Many quintessentially "Russian" works were composed in orientalist style, such as Balakirev's "Islamey", Borodin's "Prince Igor" and Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade". Orientalism, in fact, became widely considered in the West both one of the best-known aspects of Russian music and a trait of Russian national character. As leader of "The Five," Balakirev encouraged the use of eastern themes and harmonies to set their "Russian" music apart from the German symphonism of Anton Rubinstein and other Western-oriented composers. Because Rimsky-Korsakov used Russian folk and oriental melodies in his First Symphony, Stasov and the other nationalists dubbed it the "First Russian Symphony," even though Rubinstein had written his "Ocean" Symphony a dozen years before it. These were themes Balakirev had transcribed in the Caucasus. "The symphony is good," Cui wrote to Rimsky-Korsakov in 1863, while the latter was out on naval deployment. "We played it a few days ago at Balakirev's—to the great pleasure of Stassov. It is really Russian. Only a Russian could have composed it, because it lacks the slightest trace of any stagnant Germanness."


title: The Five (composers)

text: Orientalism was not confined to using authentic Eastern melodies. What became more important than the melodies themselves were the musical conventions added to them. These conventions allowed orientalism to become an avenue for writing music on subjects considered unmentionable otherwise, such as political themes and erotic fantasies. It also became a means of expressing Russian supremacy as the empire expanded under Alexander II. This was often reinforced through misogynist symbolism—the rational, active and moral Western man versus the irrational, passive and immoral Eastern woman.


title: The Five (composers)

text: Two major works entirely dominated by orientalism are Rimsky-Korsakov's symphonic suite "Antar" and Balakirev's symphonic poem "Tamara". "Antar", set in Arabia, uses two different styles of music, Western (Russian) and Eastern (Arabian). The first theme, Antar's, is masculine and Russian in character. The second theme, feminine and oriental in melodic contour, belongs to the queen, Gul Nazar. Rimsky-Korsakov was able to soften the implicit misogyny to some extent. However, female sensuality does exert a paralyzing, ultimately destructive influence. With Gul Nazar extinguishing Antar's life in a final embrace, the woman overcomes the man.


title: The Five (composers)

text: Balakirev gives a more overtly misogynistic view of oriental women in "Tamara". He had originally planned to write a Caucasan dance called a "lezginka", modeled on Glinka, for this work. However, he discovered a poem by Mikhail Lermontov about the beautiful Tamara, who lived in a tower alongside the gorge of Daryal. She lured travelers and allowed them to enjoy a night of sensual delights, only to kill them and throw their bodies into the River Terek. Balakirev uses two specific codes endemic to orientalism in writing "Tamara". The first code, based on obsessive rhythms, note repetitions, climactic effects and accelerated tempi, represents Dionysian intoxication. The second code, consisting of unpredictable rhythms, irregular phrasing and based on long passages with many repeat notes, augmented and diminished intervals and extended melismas, depict sensual longing. Not only did Balakirev use these codes extensively, but he also attempted to supercharge them further when he revised the orchestration of "Tamara" in 1898.


title: The Five (composers)

text: Rimsky-Korsakov provides the following picture of "The Mighty Handful" in his memoirs, "Chronicle of My Musical Life" (translated by J. A. Joffe):


title: The Five (composers)

text: Except perhaps for Cui, the members of this group influenced or taught many of the great Russian composers who were to follow, including Alexander Glazunov, Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov, Sergei Prokofiev, Igor Stravinsky, and Dmitri Shostakovich. They also influenced the two French symbolist composers Maurice Ravel and Claude Debussy through their radical tonal language.


title: Paul Dini

text: Paul McClaran Dini (; born August 7, 1957) is an American screenwriter and comic creator. He has been a producer and writer for several Warner Bros. Animation/DC Comics animated series, most notably "" (1992–1995), and the subsequent DC Animated Universe. Dini and Bruce Timm co-created the characters Harley Quinn and Terry McGinnis.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini began writing for Warner Bros. Animation on "Tiny Toon Adventures". In addition to "Batman: The Animated Series", Dini was a writer for "" (1996–2000), writer and co-creator for "The New Batman Adventures" (1997–1999), and writer and developer for "Batman Beyond" (1999–2001). He also co-created "Freakazoid!" (1995–1997) with Timm, produced "Duck Dodgers" (2003–2005), developed and scripted "Krypto the Superdog" (2005–2006). After leaving Warner Bros. Animation in early 2004, Dini went on to write and story edit the first season of the ABC adventure series "Lost". Dini wrote the storylines for the "" and "" video games. In 2010, he created the live action drama series "Tower Prep" for Cartoon Network.


title: Paul Dini

text: He has written a number of comic books for DC Comics. Dini and Timm collaborated on "", which won the Eisner Award for Best Single Story in 1994. Dini and illustrator Alex Ross created the graphic novels "", "", "Shazam! Power of Hope", and "". His original creations include Jingle Belle, Sheriff Ida Red, and Madame Mirage.


title: Paul Dini

text: Paul Dini was born on August 7, 1957 in New York City to Patricia (McClaran) and Robert Dini, an advertising executive. He is of Italian descent through his father. Dini attended Stevenson School in Pebble Beach, California on an art scholarship. He attended Emerson College in Boston, where he earned a BFA degree in creative writing.


title: Paul Dini

text: During college, he began doing freelance animation scripts for Filmation, and a number of other studios. In 1984, he was hired to work for George Lucas on several of his animation projects. Dini later returned to the "Star Wars" universe in 2007 to script several episodes of "".


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini wrote episodes for the 1983–1985 animated TV series, "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe", as well as contributing to interviews on the released box sets of the series. He wrote an episode for the "Dungeons & Dragons" cartoon in 1983, an episode of the Generation One "Transformers" cartoon series, "The Dweller in The Depths," an episode of the 1985 "" cartoon called "Jungle Trap", and contributed to various episodes of the "" animated series, several of which included rare appearances from the Empire.


title: Paul Dini

text: In 1989, Dini was hired at Warner Bros. Animation to work on "Tiny Toon Adventures". Later, he moved onto "", where he worked as a writer, producer and editor, later working on "", "The New Batman Adventures", and "Batman Beyond". Dini was the writer for the episode , which redefined Mr. Freeze as a tragic character and won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in an Animated Program. He continued working with WB animation, working on a number of internal projects, including "Krypto the Superdog" and "Duck Dodgers", until 2004. In 1989 and 1990, he contributed scripts to the live-action television horror anthology series "Monsters": "One Wolf's Family" and "Talk Nice to Me". Along with Bruce Timm, he created the animated series "Freakazoid!".


title: Paul Dini

text: He has earned five Emmy awards for his animation work. In a related effort, Dini was the co-author with Chip Kidd of "Batman Animated", a 1998 non-fiction coffee table book about the animated Batman franchise.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini and Bruce Timm introduced Harley Quinn in "Batman: The Animated Series" as her first appearance was the episode "Joker's Favor" and in 1994, they adapted the character into comics in "" one-shot. In 1994, Dini and Timm won both the Eisner Award for Best Single Story and the Harvey Award for Best Single Issue or Story for "Mad Love". Dini won the same Eisner prize the next year as well, for "Batman Adventures Holiday Special", (a one-shot with several Christmas-themed stories) with Timm, Ronnie del Carmen, and others. Harley Quinn was integrated into the mainstream DC Comics continuity in the "Batman: Harley Quinn" one-shot published in 1999. In "Batman Beyond", Dini and Timm co-created Terry McGinnis, the teenage Batman of the future, and his supporting cast. Dini has written several comics stories for DC Comics, including an oversized graphic novel series illustrated by painter Alex Ross featuring Superman (""), Batman (""), Shazam ("Shazam! Power of Hope"), Wonder Woman (""), and the Justice League ("Secret Origins" and "Liberty and Justice"). A hardcover collection of the Dini and Ross stories was published in 2005 under the title "The World's Greatest Super-Heroes". Among Dini's original creations is Jingle Belle, the rebellious teen-age daughter of Santa Claus.


title: Paul Dini

text: In 2002, Dini created Sheriff Ida Red, the super-powered cowgirl star of a series of books set in Dini's mythical town of Mutant, Texas. He collaborated with Kevin Smith on "". He and Bruce Timm collaborated on the "Harley and Ivy" limited series for DC in 2004. Dini became the writer for DC Comics' "Detective Comics" as of issue #821 (Sept. 2006) and created a new version of the Ventriloquist in #827 (March 2007). While Grant Morrison was starting a seven-year Batman story on the "Batman" title composed of long, interlinking arcs, Dini wrote a number of single-issue stories over the following year as well as two crossovers with Morrison's Batman, one focusing on the resurrection of Ra's al Ghul and another on the return of Hush. After Morrison's "Batman R.I.P." storyline in 2009, creators were moved around titles and Dini started writing two new Batman titles "" and "Gotham City Sirens". "Streets of Gotham" started and ended with story arcs about Hush while "Gotham City Sirens" focused on the women of Gotham; he wrote the bulk of both titles during their existence including the first and last issue of both.


title: Paul Dini

text: In 2006 he announced that he was writing a hardcover graphic novel starring Zatanna and Black Canary. In 2006, Dini was on the writing staff for the first season of the ABC adventure series "Lost". The "Lost" writers were awarded at the 2006 Writers Guild of America Awards for Outstanding Achievement in Writing for a Dramatic Television Series. The following year he was the head writer of DC's weekly series, "Countdown". Dini co-wrote a draft script for the ill-fated "Science Ninja Team Gatchaman" movie, which never saw the light of day and resulted in him leaving the project. Dini wrote a series for Top Cow Productions, based in a character he created, Madame Mirage. In July 2008, Dini started a partnership with GoAnimate to launch his Super Rica & Rashy series on the platform.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini returned to Batman animated adaptations to write the "" episode "Legends of the Dark Mite". In the same episode, he appeared in an animated form wearing Harley Quinn's costume in a comic book convention parody scene, along with Bruce Timm wearing Joker's costume next to him. He would go on to write several additional episodes for the series, including "Chill of the Night!", which contained a team-up between Batman and Zatanna, one of Dini's favorite characters. Dini penned the storyline for the Rocksteady Studios video game "", released on August 25, 2009. He wrote three episodes of "": "Cloak of Darkness," "Holocron Heist," and "Voyage of Temptation." On February 14, 2008 the first edition of Dini's column, "200 Words with Paul Dini" was released on the iFanboy site.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini is the main creator of the live action drama "Tower Prep" Cartoon Network series. On August 4, 2010, it was confirmed that Dini will be involved in Marvel Comics' upcoming animated series "Ultimate Spider-Man", which aired on Disney XD in 2012. He worked on "Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H.", an animated series centered around the Hulk and his supporting cast. Dini worked with Rocksteady studios once again to create "", which was a sequel to "". He wrote a five-issue set in the game continuity. A building in Arkham City is named Dini Towers in tribute. He did not write the storyline of the third Rocksteady game in the series, "", due to the company not wanting to hire freelance writers for future games.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini wrote the script for "Bloodspell", an original graphic novel starring Black Canary and Zatanna. He also performed rewrites on Disney's dark fantasy film "Maleficent". His graphic novel "", based on a mugging he experienced in 1993, was published in June 2016. Dini wrote the "Actionland!" chapter in "Action Comics" #1000 (June 2018) which was drawn by José Luis García-López and Kevin Nowlan.


title: Paul Dini

text: Paul Dini and his wife, magician Misty Lee, created an online interview feature called "Monkey Talk" on Kevin Smith's website, Quick Stop Entertainment.com. Dini and Misty Lee appeared on Ken Reid's "TV Guidance Counselor" podcast on April 6, 2016.


title: Paul Dini

text: In September 2020, DC Comics announced that Dini would be among the creators of a revived "Batman: Black and White" anthology series to debut on December 8, 2020. Dini wrote the prequel to "Scoob!", "Scoob! Holiday Haunt", set to release through HBO Max. It was canceled in August 2022 by Warner Bros. Discovery.


title: Paul Dini

text: Dini and his wife Misty Lee, a magician and voiceover actress, live in Los Angeles. Their two Boston terriers, Mugsy and Deuce, were featured in "Anger Management", a 2012 episode of "The Dog Whisperer", in which they sought Cesar Millan's help with their dogs' behavioral problems. Around this time, Dini began an extensive weight loss and exercise regimen which combined dog obedience training.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Sara Jane Moore (née Kahn; born February 15, 1930) is an American criminal who attempted to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford in 1975. She was given a life sentence for the attempted assassination and was released from prison on December 31, 2007, after serving 32 years. Moore and Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme are the only two women to have attempted to assassinate an American president; both of their attempts were on Gerald Ford and both took place in California within three weeks of one another.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore was born in Charleston, West Virginia, the daughter of Ruth (née Moore) and Olaf Kahn. Her paternal grandparents were German immigrants. Moore had been a nursing school student, Women's Army Corps recruit, and accountant. Divorced five times, she had four children before she turned to revolutionary politics in 1975. Moore comes from a Christian background. She later began practicing Judaism.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore's friends said that she had a fascination and an obsession with Patricia Hearst. After Hearst was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), her father Randolph Hearst created the organization People In Need (PIN) to feed the poor as a response to the SLA's claims that the elder Hearst was "committing 'crimes' against 'the people. Moore, a volunteer bookkeeper for PIN, had been serving as an FBI informant there until the moment she attempted to assassinate Ford.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore had been evaluated by the Secret Service earlier in 1975, but agents decided that she posed no danger to the president. She had been picked up by police on an illegal-handgun charge the day before the Ford incident, but was released. The police confiscated her .44 caliber revolver and 113 rounds of ammunition.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore's assassination attempt took place in San Francisco on September 22, 1975, just 17 days after Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme's attempted assassination of Ford. She was standing in the crowd across the street from the St. Francis Hotel, and was about away from Ford when she fired a single shot at him with a .38 caliber revolver. She was using a gun she bought in haste that same morning and did not know the sights were 15 cm (6 inches) off the point-of-impact at that distance, and she narrowly missed.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: After realizing she had missed, Moore raised her arm again, and Oliver Sipple, a former Marine, dived toward her and grabbed her arm, possibly saving Ford's life. Sipple said at the time: "I saw [her gun] pointed out there and I grabbed for it. [...] I lunged and grabbed the woman's arm and the gun went off." The bullet from the second shot ricocheted and hit John Ludwig, a 42-year-old taxi driver. Ludwig survived. U.S. District Judge Samuel Conti, who sentenced Moore, voiced his opinion that Moore would have killed Ford had she had her own gun, and it was only "because her gun was faulty" that the president's life was spared.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore pleaded guilty to attempted assassination and was sentenced to life in prison. At her sentencing hearing Moore stated: "Am I sorry I tried? Yes and no. Yes, because it accomplished little except to throw away the rest of my life. And, no, I'm not sorry I tried, because at the time it seemed a correct expression of my anger." She served her term at the federal women's prison in Dublin, California, where she worked in the UNICOR prison labor program for $1.25 per hour as the Lead Inmate Operating Accountant. Moore had the Federal Bureau of Prisons register number 04851-180.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: In an interview in 2004, former President Ford described Moore as "off her mind" and said that he continued making public appearances, even after two attempts on his life within such a short time, because "a president has to be aggressive, has to meet the people."


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: On December 31, 2007, at age 77, Moore was slated to be released from prison on parole after serving 32 years of her life sentence. Ford had died from natural causes on December 26, 2006, one year and five days before her release. Moore had later stated that she regretted the assassination attempt, saying she was "blinded by her radical political views". Moore was released under a federal law that makes parole mandatory for inmates who have served at least 30 years of a life sentence and have maintained a satisfactory disciplinary record. When asked about her crime in an interview, Moore stated, "I am very glad I did not succeed. I know now that I was wrong to try."


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: In February 2019, Moore was arrested for violating her parole by failing to tell her parole officer of a trip out of the country; she was subsequently released in August 2019.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: On May 28, 2009, Moore appeared on NBC's "Today" program, her first television appearance since leaving prison on parole.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore also discussed her 1979 escape from prison. She revealed that an inmate told her, "when jumping the fence just put your hand on the barbed wire, you'll only have a few puncture wounds." She went on to say, "If I knew that I was going to be captured several hours later, I would have stopped at the local bar just to get a drink and a burger."


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Excerpts from an interview with Moore by Latif Nasser appear on an episode of the radio program "Radiolab" titled "Oliver Sipple", which was released on September 22, 2017. In the interview, Moore discusses the scene from the day she attempted to assassinate President Ford and her perspective of being stopped by Oliver Sipple.


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: Moore's story is one of nine assassins starring in Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman's musical "Assassins". Moore, John Wilkes Booth, Charles J. Guiteau and Leon Czolgosz appear in "The Gun Song".


title: Sara Jane Moore

text: A biography of Moore called "Taking Aim at the President" was published in 2009 by Geri Spieler, a writer who had a correspondence with Moore for 28 years.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The drag coefficient is a common measure in automotive design as it pertains to aerodynamics. Drag is a force that acts parallel to and in the same direction as the airflow. The drag coefficient of an automobile measures the way the automobile passes through the surrounding air. When automobile companies design a new vehicle they take into consideration the automobile drag coefficient in addition to the other performance characteristics. Aerodynamic drag increases with the square of speed; therefore it becomes critically important at higher speeds. Reducing the drag coefficient in an automobile improves the performance of the vehicle as it pertains to speed and fuel efficiency. There are many different ways to reduce the drag of a vehicle. A common way to measure the drag of the vehicle is through the drag area.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The reduction of drag in road vehicles has led to increases in the top speed of the vehicle and the vehicle's fuel efficiency, as well as many other performance characteristics, such as handling and acceleration. The two main factors that impact drag are the frontal area of the vehicle and the drag coefficient. The drag coefficient is a unit-less value that denotes how much an object resists movement through a fluid such as water or air. A potential complication of altering a vehicle's aerodynamics is that it may cause the vehicle to get too much lift. Lift is an aerodynamic force that acts perpendicular to the airflow around the body of the vehicle. Too much lift can cause the vehicle to lose road traction which can be very unsafe. Lowering the drag coefficient comes from streamlining the exterior body of the vehicle. Streamlining the body requires assumptions about the surrounding airspeed and characteristic use of the vehicle.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The deletion of parts on a vehicle is an easy way for designers and vehicle owners to reduce parasitic and frontal drag of the vehicle with little cost and effort. Deletion can be as simple as removing an aftermarket part, or part that has been installed on the vehicle after production, or having to modify and remove an OEM part, meaning any part of the vehicle that was originally manufactured on the vehicle. Most production sports cars and high efficiency vehicles come standard with many of these deletions in order to be competitive in the automotive and race market, while others choose to keep these drag-increasing aspects of the vehicle for their visual aspects, or to fit the typical uses of their customer base.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: A roof rack is a common trait on many SUV and station wagon vehicles. While roof racks are very useful in carrying extra storage on a vehicle, they also increase the frontal area of the vehicle and increase the drag coefficient. This is because the air flows over the top of the vehicle, following the smooth lines of the hood and windshield, then collides with the roof rack and causes turbulence. The removal of this part has led to increases in fuel efficiency in several studies.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Mudflaps are now rarely specified as standard on production cars as they interfere with the clean airflow around the vehicle. For larger vehicles such as trucks, mud flaps are still important for their control of spray, and in 2001 a new version of the mud flap was introduced that has been shown to create significantly less aerodynamic drag than standard mud flaps.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: A rear spoiler usually comes standard in most sports vehicles and resembles the shape of a raised wing in the rear of the vehicle. The main purpose of a rear spoiler in a vehicle's design is to counteract lift, thereby increasing stability at higher speeds. In order to achieve the lowest possible drag, air must flow around the streamlined body of the vehicle without coming into contact with any areas of possible turbulence. A rear spoiler design that stands off the rear deck lid will increase downforce, reducing lift at high speeds while incurring a drag penalty. Flat spoilers, possibly angled slightly downward may reduce turbulence and thereby reduce the coefficient of drag. Some cars now feature automatically adjustable rear spoilers, so at lower speed the effect on drag is reduced when the benefits of reduced lift are not required.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Side mirrors both increase the frontal area of the vehicle and increase the coefficient of drag since they protrude from the side of the vehicle. In order to decrease the impact that side mirrors have on the drag of the vehicle the side mirrors can be replaced with smaller mirrors or mirrors with a different shape. Several concept cars of the 2010s are replacing mirrors with tiny cameras but this option is not common for production cars because most countries require side mirrors. One of the first production passenger automobiles to swap out mirrors for cameras was the Honda e, and in this case the cameras are claimed by Honda to have decreased aerodynamic drag by "around 90% compared to conventional door mirrors" which contributed to an approximately 3.8% reduction in drag for the entire vehicle. It is estimated that two side mirrors are responsible for 2 to 7% of the total aerodynamic drag of a motor vehicle, and that removing them could improve fuel economy by 1.5–2 miles per US gallon.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: While they do not have the biggest impact on the drag coefficient due to their small size, radio antennas commonly found protruding from the front of the vehicle can be relocated and changed in design to rid the car of this added drag. The most common replacement for the standard car antenna is the shark fin antenna found in most high efficiency vehicles.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The effect that windshield wipers have on a vehicle's airflow varies between vehicles; however, they are often omitted from race vehicles and high efficiency concepts in order to maintain the smallest possible coefficient of drag. A much more common option is to replace the windshield wipers with lower profile wipers, or to only remove the windshield wiper on the passenger side of the vehicle, and even to fabricate a deflector to deflect the air up and over the wipers.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Another alternative is to equip the vehicle with a single wiper placed in the centre of the windshield, allowing it to cover both sides of the windshield. This mitigates the amount of drag by decreasing the frontal area of the blade. While such application may be useful for racing, for most road vehicles this would produce minimal improvement in overall drag reduction.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The application of new parts and concepts onto the vehicle design are easier to include when in the design stage of a vehicle, rather than in aftermarket (automotive) parts, however, the fabrication of these parts assists in the streamlining of the vehicle and can help greatly reduce the drag of the vehicle. Most vehicles with very low drag coefficients, such as race cars and high efficiency concept cars, apply these ideas to their design.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: When air flows around the wheel wells it gets disturbed by the rims of the vehicles and forms an area of turbulence around the wheel. In order for the air to flow more smoothly around the wheel well, smooth wheel covers are often applied. Smooth wheel covers are hub caps with no holes in them for air to pass through. This design reduces drag; however, it may cause the brakes to heat up more quickly because the covers prevent airflow around the brake system. As a result, this modification is more commonly seen in high efficiency vehicles rather than sports cars or racing vehicles.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Air curtains divert air flow from slots in the body and guide it towards the outside edges of the wheel wells.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The front grille of a vehicle is used to direct air through the radiator. In a streamlined design the air flows around the vehicle rather than through; however, the grille of a vehicle redirects airflow from around the vehicle to through the vehicle, which then increases the drag. In order to reduce this impact a grille block is often used. A grille block covers up a portion of, or the entirety of, the front grille of a vehicle. In most high efficiency models or in vehicles with low drag coefficients, a very small grille will already be built into the vehicle's design, eliminating the need for a grille block. The grille in most production vehicles is generally designed to maximize air flow through the radiator where it exits into the engine compartment. This design can actually create too much airflow into the engine compartment, preventing it from warming up in a timely manner, and in such cases a grille block is used to increase engine performance and reduce vehicle drag simultaneously.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The underside of a vehicle often traps air in various places and adds turbulence around the vehicle. In most racing vehicles this is eliminated by covering the entire underside of the vehicle in what is called an under tray. This tray prevents any air from becoming trapped under the vehicle and reduces drag.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Fender skirts are often made as extensions of the body panels of the vehicles and cover the entire wheel wells. Much like smooth wheel covers this modification reduces the drag of the vehicle by preventing any air from becoming trapped in the wheel well and assists in streamlining the body of the vehicle. Fender skirts are more commonly found on the rear wheel wells of a vehicle because the tires do not turn and the design is much simpler. This is commonly seen in vehicles such as the first generation Honda Insight. Front fender skirts have the same effect on reducing drag as the rear wheel skirts, but must be further offset from the body in order to compensate for the tire sticking out from the body of the vehicle as turns are made.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The front bumper is the first part of the vehicle that the air must flow around. Therefore, it plays a crucial role in reducing drag. A front air dam is often used which extends from the very front of the vehicle down to the lowest part of the vehicle. This is done to direct airflow around and over the vehicle rather than allowing air to travel under it. Contoured deflectors, or tire spats, are often made as part of the front bumper in order to direct airflow around the tire without having any increase to the outward flow.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: A boattail can greatly reduce a vehicle's total drag. Boattails create a teardrop shape that will give the vehicle a more streamlined profile, reducing the occurrence of drag inducing flow separation. A kammback is a truncated boattail. It is created as an extension of the rear of the vehicle, moving the rear backward at a slight angle toward the bumper of the car. This can reduce drag as well but a boattail would reduce the vehicles drag more. Nonetheless, for practical and style reasons, a kammback is more commonly seen in racing, high efficiency vehicles, and trucking.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The average modern automobile achieves a drag coefficient of between 0.25 and 0.3. Sport utility vehicles (SUVs), with their typically boxy shapes, typically achieve a . The drag coefficient of a vehicle is affected by the shape of body of the vehicle. Various other characteristics affect the coefficient of drag as well, and are taken into account in these examples. Some sports cars have a surprisingly high drag coefficient (such as the Ariel Atom at 0.40), but this is to compensate for the amount of lift the vehicle generates, while others use aerodynamics to their advantage to gain speed and as a result have much lower drag coefficients.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Some examples of follow. Figures given are generally for the basic model, which may not be available in some markets. Some "high performance" models may actually have higher drag, due to wider tires, extra spoilers and larger cooling systems as many basic/low power models have half size radiators with the remaining area blanked off to reduce cooling and engine bay drag.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The of a given vehicle will vary depending on which wind tunnel it is measured in. Variations of up to 5% have been documented and variations in test technique and analysis can also make a difference. So if the same vehicle with a was measured in a different tunnel it could be anywhere from to .


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: While designers pay attention to the overall shape of the automobile, they also bear in mind that reducing the frontal area of the shape helps reduce the drag. The product of drag coefficient and area – drag area – is represented as (or CA), a multiplication of value by area.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: The term "drag area" derives from aerodynamics, where it is the product of some reference area (such as cross-sectional area, total surface area, or similar) and the drag coefficient. In 2003, "Car and Driver" magazine adopted this metric as a more intuitive way to compare the aerodynamic efficiency of various automobiles.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Where the drag coefficient and reference area have been collapsed into the drag area term. This allows direct estimation of the drag force at a given speed for any vehicle for which only the drag area is known and therefore easier comparison.


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: As drag area is the fundamental value that determines power required for a given cruise speed it is a critical parameter for fuel consumption at a steady speed. This relation also allows an estimation of the new top speed of a car with a tuned engine:


title: Automobile drag coefficient

text: Average full-size passenger cars have a drag area of roughly . Reported drag areas range from the 1999 Honda Insight at to the 2003 Hummer H2 at . The drag area of a bicycle (and rider) is also in the range of .


title: 2022 Eliteserien

text: The 2022 Eliteserien is the 78th season of top-tier football in Norway. This is the sixth season of Eliteserien after rebranding from Tippeligaen.


title: 2022 Eliteserien

text: The season started on 2 April 2022 and is scheduled to end on 13 November 2022, not including play-off matches.


title: 2022 Eliteserien

text: Bodø/Glimt are the defending champions. HamKam, Aalesund and Jerv joined as the promoted clubs from the 2021 Norwegian First Division. They replaced Brann, Stabæk and Mjøndalen who were relegated to the 2022 Norwegian First Division.


title: 2022 Eliteserien

text: Sixteen teams compete in the league – the top thirteen teams from the previous season, and three teams promoted from the First Division. The promoted teams were HamKam (returning to the top flight after a thirteen season absence), Aalesund (returning to the top flight after a one season absence) and Jerv (first season in the top flight). They replaced Brann, Stabæk and Mjøndalen, ending their top flight spells of six, eight and three years respectively.


title: 2022 Eliteserien

text: The 14th-placed team in Eliteserien will face the winners of the First Division promotion play-offs over two legs to decide who will play in Eliteserien next season.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: According to data from the 1989 Soviet census, the population of the USSR was 70% East Slavs, 17% Turkic peoples, and all other ethnic groups below 2%. Alongside the atheist majority of 60% there were sizable minorities of Russian Orthodox Christians (approx. 20%) and Muslims (approx. 15%).


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Russia lost former territories of the Russian Empire with about 30 million inhabitants after the Russian Revolution of 1917 (Poland: 18 million; Finland: 3 million; Romania: 3 million; the Baltic states: 5 million and Kars to Turkey: 400 thousand). At least 2 million citizens of the former Russian Empire died in the course of the Russian Civil War of 1917–1923, and a further 1 to 2 million emigrated.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: During the Second World War on the Eastern Front, the Soviet Union lost an approximate 26.6 million people.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: After the Second World War, the population of the Soviet Union began to gradually recover itself to pre-war levels, by 1959 this had been surpassed with a registered 209,035,000 people over the 1941 population count of 196,716,000.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The crude birth rate in the Soviet Union throughout its history had been decreasing - from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mostly due to urbanization and rising average age of marriages. The crude death rate had been gradually decreasing as well - from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. While death rates did not differ greatly across regions of the Soviet Union through much of Soviet history, birth rates in southern republics of Transcaucasia and Central Asia were much higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post-World War II period. This was partly due to slower rates of urbanization and traditionally early marriages in southern republics.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: As a result, mainly of differential birthrates, with most of the European nationalities moving toward sub-replacement fertility and the Central Asian and other nationalities of southern republics having well-above replacement-level fertility, the percentage who were Russians was gradually being reduced. According to some Western scenarios of the 1990s, if the Soviet Union had stayed together it is likely that Russians would have lost their majority status in the 2000s (decade). This differential could not be offset by assimilation of non-Russians by Russians, in part because the nationalities of southern republics maintained a distinct ethnic consciousness and were not easily assimilated.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a dramatic reversal of the path of declining mortality in the Soviet Union, and was especially notable among men in working ages, and also especially in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. While not unique to the Soviet Union (Hungary in particular showed a pattern that was similar to Russia), this male mortality increase, accompanied by a noticeable increase in infant mortality rates in the early 1970s, drew the attention of Western demographers and Sovietologists at the time.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late 1970s and the early 1980s, the situation for adult mortality began to improve again. Referring to data for the two decades ending in 1989–1990, while noting some abatement in adult mortality rates in the Soviet republics in the 1980s, Ward Kingkade and Eduardo Arriaga characterized this situation as follows: "All of the former Soviet countries have followed the universal tendency for mortality to decline as infectious diseases are brought under control while death rates from degenerative diseases rise. What is exceptional in the former Soviet countries and some of their East European neighbors is that a subsequent increase in mortality from causes other than infectious disease has brought about overall rises in mortality from all causes combined. Another distinctive characteristic of the former Soviet case is the presence of unusually high levels of mortality from accidents and other external causes, which are typically associated with alcoholism."


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The rising infant mortality rates in the Soviet Union in the 1970s became the subject of much discussion and debate among Western demographers. The infant mortality rate (IMR) had increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise in infant mortality as largely real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. Others regarded it as largely an artifact of improved reporting of infant deaths, and found the increases to be concentrated in the Central Asian republics where improvement in coverage and reporting of births and deaths might well have the greatest effect on increasing the published rates.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The rising reported adult mortality and infant mortality was not explained or defended by Soviet officials at the time. Instead, they simply stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late 1980s when the publication of mortality data resumed and researchers could delve into the real and artificial aspects of the reported mortality increases. When these researchers began to report their findings, they accepted the increases in adult male mortality as real and focused their research on explaining its causes and finding solutions. In contrast, investigations of the rise in reported infant mortality concluded that while the reported increases in the IMR were largely an artifact of improved reporting of infant deaths in the Central Asian republics, the actual levels in this region were much higher than had yet been reported officially. In this sense the reported "rise" in infant mortality in the Soviet Union as a whole was an artifact of improved statistical reporting, but reflected the reality of a much higher actual infant mortality "level" than had previously been recognized in official statistics.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: As the detailed data series that was ultimately published in the late 1980s showed, the reported IMR for the Soviet Union as a whole increased from 24.7 in 1970 to a peak of 31.4 in 1976. After that the IMR gradually decreased and by 1989 it had fallen to 22.7, which was lower than had been reported in any previous year (though close to the figure of 22.9 in 1971). In 1989, the IMR ranged from a low of 11.1 in the Latvian SSR to a high of 54.7 in the Turkmen SSR.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Research conducted subsequent to the dissolution of the Soviet Union revealed that the originally reported mortality rates very substantially underestimated the actual rates, especially for infant mortality. This has been shown for Transcaucasian and Central Asian republics.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Russia lost former territories of the Russian Empire with about 30 million inhabitants after the Russian Revolution of 1917 (Poland: 18 million; Finland: 3 million; Romania: 3 million; the Baltic states: 5 million and Kars to Turkey: 400 thousand). At least 2 million citizens of the former Russian Empire died in the course of the Russian Civil War of 1917–1923, and a further 1 to 2 million emigrated. An estimated 800,000 to 1,200,000 people died during the purges of the 1930s.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: According to the Russian Academy of Sciences the Soviet Union suffered 26.6 million deaths (1941-1945) during World War II, including an increase in infant mortality of 1.3 million. Total war-loss figures include territories annexed by the Soviet Union in 1939–1945.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Although the population growth-rate decreased over time, it remained positive throughout the history of the Soviet Union in all republics, and the population grew each year by more than 2 million except during periods of wartime, and famine.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: A newborn Soviet child in 1926–27 had a life expectancy of 44.4 years, up from 32.3 years in the Russian Empire thirty years before. By 1958–59, the life expectancy for newborns had reached 68.6 years. The life expectancy in the United States in 1958–59 was 66.2 for men and 72.9 for women. Life expectancy in the Soviet Union remained fairly stable during most years, although in the 1970s it decreased slightly.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The following demographic statistics are from the 1990 edition of the CIA World Factbook, unless otherwise indicated.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Labor force: 152,300,000 civilians; 80% industry and other nonagricultural fields, 20% agriculture; shortage of skilled labor (1989)


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Organized labor: 98% of workers were union members; all trade unions are organized within the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions (AUCCTU) and conduct their work under guidance of the Communist party. There was a market relationship between the people and the state as the employer; people were free to choose their job and leave if they wished, although members of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union could be ordered to work in certain places, but seldom were.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The Soviet Union was one of the world's most ethnically diverse countries, with more than 100 distinct national ethnicities living within its borders.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Other ethnic groups included Abkhaz, Adyghes, Aleuts, Assyrians, Avars, Bashkirs, Bulgarians, Buryats, Chechens, Chinese, Chuvash, Cossacks, Crimean Tatars, Evenks, Finns, Gagauz, Germans, Greeks, Hungarians, Ingushes, Inuit, Jews, Kalmyks, Karakalpaks, Karelians, Kets, Koreans, Lezgins, Maris, Mongols, Mordvins, Nenetses, Ossetians, Poles, Roma, Romanians, Tats, Tatars, Tuvans, Udmurts, and Yakuts. Dozens of these other ethnic groups were the titular nations of different Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics or Autonomous Oblasts within the union-level republics (ex. Tatars in Tatar ASSR within the RSFSR, Abkhaz ASSR within Georgia) or had been previously (Volga German ASSR, Crimean ASSR).


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: The Soviet Union promoted state atheism from 1928 to 1941, in which religion was largely discouraged and heavily persecuted. The USSR remained a secular state from 1945 until its dissolution. However, according to various Soviet and Western sources, over one-third of the country's people professed religious beliefs: Russian Orthodox 20%, Muslim 15%, Protestant, Georgian Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, and Roman Catholic 7%, Jewish less than 1%, atheist 60% (1990 est.). Some indigenous pagan belief systems existed in the Siberian and Russian Far Eastern lands in the local populations.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Russian became the official language of the Soviet Union in 1990. Until that time it was still necessary to have a language of common communication. The "de facto" result inevitably favored Russian, the native language of half Soviet citizens.


title: Demographics of the Soviet Union

text: Overall Soviet citizens spoke more than 200 languages and dialects (at least 18 with more than 1 million speakers); Slavic group: 75%, other Indo-European: 8%, Altaic: 12%, Uralic: 3%, Caucasian: 2% (1990 est.)


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: "Betty" (stylized in all lowercase) is a song by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, taken from her eighth studio album, "Folklore" (2020). It was written by Swift and Joe Alwyn (under the pseudonym William Bowery), who produced the track with Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff. MCA Nashville and Republic Records released the song to US country radio on August 17, 2020. "Betty" is an Americana-inspired song combining country, folk rock, and guitar pop. Its production consists of a harmonica, a harpsichord, and plenty of guitars with a key change after the bridge.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: The lyrics are about a relationship between two fictitious characters named James and Betty. Some media publications initially interpreted the song in a queer context due to the lyrics not mentioning James's gender, but Swift stated that James is a 17-year-old boy. Narrated from his perspective, "Betty" is about his apology to Betty after having cheated on her. They are two of the three characters involved in a love triangle depicted in three "Folklore" tracks, the other two being "Cardigan" (from Betty's perspective) and "August" (from the remaining unnamed character's perspective).


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Music critics noted "Betty" for reminiscing of Swift's early country-music songs and praised its engaging storytelling. The song peaked at number six on "Billboard" Hot Country Songs chart and number 42 on the "Billboard" Hot 100. It peaked within the top 40 on singles charts in Australia, Canada, and Singapore. The single was certified gold by Music Canada (MC). Swift first performed "Betty" live at the 55th Academy of Country Music Awards on September 16, 2020; the performance was recorded and released on digital music platforms two days later.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift conceived her eighth studio album, "Folklore", while quarantining amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Produced by Swift, Jack Antonoff, and Aaron Dessner of the National, it was released on July 24, 2020, by Republic Records. "Betty" is the only song on "Folklore" produced by both Antonoff and Dessner. For the song's sound, Swift used Bob Dylan's albums "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" (1963) and "John Wesley Harding" (1967) as reference points.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: The song features a co-writing credit from Swift's partner Joe Alwyn, whom was initially credited under the pseudonym William Bowery. She stated that, one day, she heard Alwyn "singing the entire, fully formed chorus...from another room" and asked if they could write a song together while in quarantine, which eventually became "Betty". Swift cited Patty Griffin's "Top of the World" (2004) as her inspiration to write from a male perspective.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: On July 23, 2020, Swift revealed the track listing of "Folklore", where "Betty" placed fourteenth, and released the album on July 24, 2020. In the primer that preceded the release, Swift teased imageries of various tracks, with "Betty" being about "a seventeen-year-old standing on a porch, learning to apologize." On August 17, 2020, the song was made a single to US country radio stations by MCA Nashville.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Like the majority of "Folklore", "Betty" displays vivid storytelling. It is one of the three tracks on the album that depicts a fictitious storyline, what Swift refers to as the "teenage love triangle", along with "Cardigan" and "August". These three tracks narrate the story of the same love triangle from the perspectives of each of the characters involved, at different times in their lives. "Betty" is the tale from the perspective of the cheating boyfriend James, whose girlfriend is Betty, as he involves himself in a "summer fling" with the unnamed female narrator of "August". Therefore, James debates "show[ing] up" at Betty's party to reconcile with her. He apologizes about his past mistakes but does not fully own up to them, citing his disdain of crowds and Betty's "wandering eye" as excuses.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: "Betty" has been described as a country, folk rock, guitar pop, and neofolk tune, with elements of Americana, propelled by an interlacing harmonica, a multitude of guitars: acoustic, electric, pedal steel, lap steel, high string and bass guitars, and other instruments such as a harpsichord, vibraphone, saxophones, drums, percussions, Mellotron and a Wurlitzer electric piano. Swift explained the song as follows:


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Written in the key of C major, "Betty" has a moderate tempo of 96 beats per minute. Swift's vocals in the song span between a range of G to G. The lyrical structure of "Betty" is characterized by a dramatic shift from the verses' past tense, to conditional sentences in the chorus, to the present tense in the climax, where a key change occurs between its bridge and final chorus. Inez is an additional character named in the song, who is portrayed as a gossiping neighbor. James confesses that, even though Betty does not usually believe Inez because her gossips are mostly false, Inez is right this time about him. The characters—James, Betty and Inez—are named after the daughters of actors Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Due to the lack of mention of James's gender anywhere in the album, "Betty" is also interpreted as a queer anthem. When Dessner was asked about the song's potential queerness, he replied: "I can't speak to what it's about. I have my own ideas. I also know where Taylor's heart is, and I think that's great anytime a song takes on greater meaning for anyone".


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Hannah Myrlea of "NME" called "Betty" a sweet tune that evokes a nostalgia for Swift's older country sound. Likewise, "Time"'s Raisa Bruner also opined that the song sees Swift returning to her country roots. Rob Sheffield of "Rolling Stone" compared the harmonica in "Betty" to that in Bruce Springsteen's 1975 song "Thunder Road". "Pitchfork"'s Jillian Mapes commended "Betty" as "youthful hope of a song" like the Chicks' 1998 single "Wide Open Spaces", but is notably wiser and "queerer" than the high school romances Swift generally wrote about during her teenage years. Also writing for "Pitchfork", Vrinda Jagota stated that the song exemplifies the maturity and nuance that Swift has gained since her teens.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Rob Harvilla of "The Ringer" thought that the "semi-buoyant" song recalls Swift's 2006 debut into the country music scene, prompting her sensitive but sly songwriting, and lauded on how "Betty" interweaves with other tracks on "Folklore". "The Atlantic" writer Spencer Kornhaber opined that the suspenseful storytelling made him "stand up and put my hands on my head while waiting for it to end", and pointed out that the song first felt like a tale of same-sex desire before arriving at its bridge. Jonathan Pertile of "The Duke Chronicle" praised its key change, calling it the most effective since Swift's 2008 hit, "Love Story", and her "skilled" manipulation of perspective, painting a wise Betty in "Cardigan", but a hapless James, who resorts to excuses of "I'm only seventeen, I don't know anything". In agreement, Dave Holmes of "Esquire" also compared the key change to that of "Love Story", designating "Betty" the centerpiece of "Folklore".


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Zachary Kephart of "Country Universe" dubbed the song a "full-circle moment" and "fitting" return for Swift, because it is told from a younger perspective. He complimented the instrumentals and thought that "Betty" works better as a deep cut than a radio single. Ellen Johnson of "Paste" named the track as one of the best country songs of 2020, stating that it proves Swift's empathy "truly knows no bounds", being written from the point of view of a "regretful" teenage boy. "The New York Times" listed "Betty" in the top 15 of their ranking of best songs of 2020.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: "Betty" has been interpreted as a gay anthem. As James's gender is not revealed anywhere in the song or the album, many commentators interpreted the track to be having an underlying queer theme, especially lesbian romance. However, Swift has explicitly stated that she originally envisioned James as a boy. Callie Ahlgrim of Insider Inc. said Swift stating the song's narrator is a boy does not negate the LGBT fans' interpretations of the song.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: At the 2021 BMI London Awards, "Betty" won an award for "Most Performed Songs of the Year", marking Alwyn's first BMI win.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Upon release of "Folklore", "Betty" debuted at number 6 on the "Billboard" Hot Country Songs chart, and number 42 on the "Billboard" Hot 100, both dated August 8, 2020. It is Swift's twenty-second top-ten hit on the former—her first since "Soon You'll Get Better" (2019) and her highest debut since the Tim McGraw duet "Highway Don't Care" (2013); it also marked the highest debut for a woman since Bebe Rexha's "Meant to Be" (2017). The song debuted at number 60 on the Country Airplay chart, marking Swift's thirty-sixth entry on the chart and the first since her Sugarland collaboration "Babe" (2018). "Betty" also arrived at number-one on the "Billboard" Country Streaming Songs chart with 14.5 million streams collected. It sold 3,000 downloads and opened at the fifteenth spot of "Billboard" Country Digital Song Sales chart.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: When it was released as a single to US country radio on August 17, 2020, "Betty" debuted at number-one on the format's add-board of the week, gaining support from 58 Mediabase-monitored country radio stations. Asserting Swift "the biggest star in music" who transcends formats, the KKBQ Houston program director, Johnny Chiang, stated that country music is "lucky, because at Taylor's core, she's a singer-songwriter and her music has meaning. Isn't that what country is all about? "Betty" fits perfectly".


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Elsewhere, "Betty" peaked at number 22 on Australia's ARIA Singles and Singapore's Top 30 Digital Streaming charts, number 32 on the Canadian Hot 100, and number 92 on UK Downloads chart. Upon the release of its live version, the song opened at numbers 58 and 88 on Scottish Singles and Irish Singles charts, respectively. Following the inauguration of the "Billboard" Global 200 chart seven weeks after "Folklore"'s launch, "Betty" appeared on the chart at number 180, dated September 19, 2020.


title: Betty (Taylor Swift song)

text: Swift first performed "Betty" live at the 55th Academy of Country Music Awards at the Grand Ole Opry House on September 16, 2020, marking Swift's first performance at a country-music show in seven years. Seated in front of a glowing stage light, she performed the clean version on a black Gibson acoustic guitar and was accompanied by one harmonica player. She wore a burgundy sequined turtleneck and khaki pants. The live version was released onto music streaming and digital platforms on September 18, 2020. Swift auctioned off the Gibson guitar, which she autographed, at Christie's auction house, as part of Academy of Country Music's COVID-19 relief fund.


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: Silas Weir Mitchell (born Silas Weir Mitchell Neilson; September 30, 1969) is an American character actor. He is known for starring as Charles "Haywire" Patoshik in the Fox television series "Prison Break" (2005–2007), for the recurring role of Donny Jones in "My Name Is Earl" (2005–2009), and as Monroe in the NBC television series "Grimm" (2011–2017).


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: Mitchell was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is named after an ancestor, the 19th century physician and author Silas Weir Mitchell.


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: He attended The Montgomery County Day School (formerly in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania) for his elementary school years; is a graduate of St. Paul's School, a college-preparatory boarding school in Concord, New Hampshire, (1987); Brown University (1991) in Rhode Island, where he majored in Theatre and Religion; and the University of California San Diego, Master of Fine Arts graduate acting program.


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: After graduating from Brown, he spent some time in New York City, acting in minor theatre productions.


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: Mitchell has had recurring guest roles in such television series as "24" as Eli Stram; Numb3rs; "My Name Is Earl" as Earl's ex-con friend Donny Jones; and "Prison Break" as escapee Charles "Haywire" Patoshik. On the DVD commentary for "Prison Break", he mentions he had previously auditioned for the roles of Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell and Lincoln Burrows. Mitchell plays the role of an insane prison inmate in both "Prison Break" and "My Name Is Earl". He also appears in "Rat Race" (2001) as Lloyd (The Hardware Store Guy), and in "The Whole Ten Yards" as Yermo.


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: One of his most notable roles is that of mentally unstable recurring character James Hogan on "Cold Case". Mitchell also made appearances on "", "", "", "Burn Notice" as charming but unstable arms dealer Seymour, "Dexter", "Monk", "Six Feet Under", "X-Files", "The Closer", and "Boomtown". He also appeared on the show "" in the Season 6 episode "Room Service".


title: Silas Weir Mitchell (actor)

text: In 2009, he appeared in "A Fork in the Road", alongside Jaime King, and in "Halloween 2". Mitchell also appeared in Fox's TV show, "Mental" with Chris Vance, also from "Prison Break".


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: The economic history of the United Kingdom relates the economic development in the British state from the absorption of Wales into the Kingdom of England after 1535 to the modern United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland of the early 21st century.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Scotland, England, and Wales shared a monarch from 1601 but their economies were run separately until they were unified in the 1707 Act of Union. Ireland was incorporated in the United Kingdom economy between 1800 and 1922; from 1922 the Irish Free State (the modern Republic of Ireland) became independent and set its own economic policy.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Great Britain, and England in particular, became one of the most prosperous economic regions in the world between the late 1600s and early 1800s as a result of being the birthplace of the industrial revolution that began in the mid-eighteenth century. The developments brought by industrialization resulted in Britain becoming the premier European and global economic, political, and military power for more than a century. As the first to industrialize, Britain’s industrialists revolutionized areas like manufacturing, communication, and transportation through innovations such as the steam engine (for pumps, factories, railway locomotives and steamships), textile equipment, tool-making, the Telegraph, and pioneered the railway system. With these many new technologies Britain manufactured much of the equipment and products used by other nations, becoming known as the “workshop of the world”. Its businessmen were leaders in international commerce and banking, trade and shipping. Its markets included both areas that were independent and those that were part of the rapidly expanding British Empire, which by the early 1900s had become the largest empire in history. After 1840, the economic policy of mercantilism was abandoned and replaced by free trade, with fewer tariffs, quotas or restrictions, first outlined by British economist Adam Smith’s "Wealth of Nations". Briton’s globally dominant Royal Navy protected British commercial interests, shipping and international trade, while the British legal system provided a system for resolving disputes relatively inexpensively, and the City of London functioned as the economic capital and focus of the world economy.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Between 1870 and 1900, economic output per head of the United Kingdom rose by 50 percent (from about £28 per capita to £41 in 1900: an annual average increase in real incomes of 1% p.a.), growth which was associated with a significant rise in living standards. However, and despite this significant economic growth, some economic historians have suggested that Britain experienced a "relative" economic decline in the last third of the nineteenth century as industrial expansion occurred in the United States and Germany. In 1870, Britain's output per head was the second highest in the world, surpassed only by Australia. In 1914, British income per capita was the world's third highest, exceeded only by New Zealand and Australia; these three countries shared a common economic, social and cultural heritage. In 1950, British output per head was still 30 percent over that of the average of the six founder members of the EEC, but within 20 years it had been overtaken by the majority of western European economies.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: The response of successive British governments to this problematic performance was to seek economic growth stimuli within what became the European Union; Britain entered the European Community in 1973. Thereafter the United Kingdom's relative economic performance improved substantially to the extent that, on the eve of the 2007 financial crisis, British income per capita exceeded, albeit marginally, that of France and Germany; furthermore, there was a significant reduction in the gap in income per capita terms between the UK and USA.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: During 16th and 17th century many fundamental economic changes occurred, these resulted in rising incomes and paved the way to the industrialisation. After 1600, the North Sea Region took over the role of the leading economic centre of Europe from the Mediterranean, which prior to this date, particularly in northern Italy, had been the most highly developed part of Europe. Great Britain, together with the Low Countries, profited more in the long run from the expansion of trade in the Atlantic and Asia than the pioneers of this trade, Spain and Portugal, fundamentally because of the success of the mainly privately owned enterprises in these two Northern countries in contrast to the arguably less successful state-owned economic systems in Iberia.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Following the Black Death in the mid 14th century, and the agricultural depression of the late 15th century, the population began to increase. The export of woollen products resulted in an economic upturn with products exported to mainland Europe. Henry VII negotiated the favourable Intercursus Magnus treaty in 1496.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: The high wages and abundance of available land seen in the late 15th century and early 16th century were temporary. When the population recovered, low wages and a land shortage returned. Historians in the early 20th century characterized the economic in terms of general decline, manorial reorganization, and agricultural contraction. Later historians dropped those themes and stressed the transitions between medieval forms and Tudor progress.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: John Leland left rich descriptions of the local economies he witnessed during his travels 1531 to 1560. He described markets, ports, industries, buildings and transport links. He showed some small towns were expanding, through new commercial and industrial opportunities, especially cloth manufacture. He found other towns in decline, and suggested that investment by entrepreneurs and benefactors had enabled some small towns to prosper. Taxation was a negative factor in economic growth, since it was imposed, not on consumption, but on capital investments.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: According to Derek Hirst, outside of politics and religion, the 1640s and 1650s saw a revived economy characterized by growth in manufacturing, the elaboration of financial and credit instruments, and the commercialization Of communication. The gentry found time for leisure activities, such as horse racing and bowling. In the high culture important innovations included the development of a mass market for music, increased scientific research, and an expansion of publishing. All the trends were discussed in depth at the newly established coffee houses.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Spanish and Portuguese colonies in the New World exported large quantities of silver and gold to Europe, some of which added to the English money supply. There were multiple results that all expanded the English economy, according to Dr. Nuno Palma of the University of Manchester. The key features of the growth pattern included specialisation and structural change, and increases in market participation. The new supply of specie (silver and gold) increased the money supply. Instead of promissory notes paid off by future promissory notes, business transactions were supported by specie. This reduced transaction costs, increased the coverage of the market, and opened incentives and opportunities to participate in cash transaction. Demand arose for luxury goods from Asia, such as silk and pepper, which created new markets. The increased supply of specie made tax collection easier, allowing the government to build up fiscal capacity and provide for public goods.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Various inflationary pressures existed; some were due to an influx of New World gold and a rising population. Inflation had a negative effect on the real wealth of most families. It set the stage for social upheaval as the gap between the rich and poor widening. This was a period of significant change for the majority of the rural population, with manorial land owners introducing enclosure measures.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Exports increased significantly, especially within the British empire. Mostly privately owned companies traded with the colonies in the West Indies, Northern America and India.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: The Company of Merchant Adventurers of London brought together London's leading overseas merchants in a regulated company in the early 15th century, in the nature of a guild. Its members' main business was the export of cloth, especially white (undyed) woollen broadcloth. This enabled them to import a large range of foreign goods. Given the trade conditions of the time, England came up with a public policy to increase Armenian merchant's involvement in English trade to pursue its commercial interests. Accordingly, in 1688 a trade agreement was signed in London between English East India Company and Kjoja Panos Kalantar. Armenian merchants received privileges to carry out commercial activities in England. England, in its turn, wanted to change the main trade route from Europe to Asia, and from now on, Armenians, instead of overlanding in Arabia or Persia, used England. With this agreement, England wanted to take over the control that Dutch and France had at that time on world exports.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Woollen cloth was the chief export and most important employer after agriculture. The golden era of the Wiltshire woollen industry was in the reign of Henry VIII. In the medieval period, raw wool had been exported, but now England had an industry, based on its 11 million sheep. London and towns purchased wool from dealers, and send it to rural households where family labour turned it into cloth. They washed the wool, carded it and spun it into thread, which was then turned into cloth on a loom. Export merchants, known as Merchant Adventurers, exported woollens into the Netherlands and Germany, as well as other lands. The arrival of Huguenots from France brought in new skills that expanded the industry.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Government intervention proved a disaster in the early 17th century. A new company convinced Parliament to transfer to them the monopoly held by the old, well-established Company of Merchant Adventurers. Arguing that the export of unfinished cloth was much less profitable than the export of the finished product, the new company got Parliament to ban the export of unfinished cloth. There was massive dislocation marketplace, as large unsold quantities built up, prices fell, and unemployment rose. Worst of all, the Dutch retaliated and refused to import any finished cloth from England. Exports fell by a third. Quickly the ban was lifted, and the Merchant Adventurers got its monopoly back. However, the trade losses became permanent.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Diet depended largely upon social class. The rich ate meat—beef, pork, venison and white bread; the poor ate coarse dark bread, with a little meat, notably at Christmas. Game poaching supplemented the diet of the rural poor. Everyone drank ale or cider as water was often too impure to drink. Fruits and vegetables were seldom eaten. Rich spices were used by the wealthy to offset the smells of stale salted meat. The potato had yet to become part of the diet. The rich enjoyed desserts such as pastries, tarts, cakes, and crystallized fruit, and syrup.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Among the rich private hospitality was an important item in their budget. Entertaining a royal party for a few weeks could be ruinous to a nobleman. Inns existed for travellers but restaurants were not known.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Both the rich and the poor had diets with nutritional deficiency. The lack of vegetables and fruits in their diets caused a deficiency in vitamin C, sometimes resulting in scurvy.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: Trade and industry flourished in the 16th century, making England more prosperous and improving the standard of living of the upper and middle classes. However, the lower classes did not benefit much and did not always have enough food. As the English population was fed by its own agricultural produce, a series of bad harvests in the 1590s caused widespread distress.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: In the 17th century the food supply improved. England had no food crises from 1650 to 1725, a period when France was unusually vulnerable to famines. Historians point out that oat and barley prices in England did not always increase following a failure of the wheat crop, but did so in France.


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: About one-third of the population lived in poverty, with the wealthy expected to give alms to assist the impotent poor. Tudor law was harsh on the able-bodied poor, those physically fit but unable to find work. Those who left their parishes in order to locate work were termed vagabonds and could be subjected to punishments, often suffering whipping and being put in the stocks. This treatment was inflicted to encourage them to return to their "mother parish."


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: The 18th century was prosperous as entrepreneurs extended the range of their business around the globe. By the 1720s Britain was one of the most prosperous countries in the world, and Daniel Defoe boasted:


title: Economic history of the United Kingdom

text: While the other major powers were primarily motivated toward territorial gains, and protection of their dynasties (such as the Habsburg and Bourbon dynasties, and Prussia's House of Hohenzollern), Britain had a different set of primary interests. Its main diplomatic goal (besides protecting the homeland from invasion) was building a worldwide trading network for its merchants, manufacturers, shippers and financiers. This required a hegemonic Royal Navy so powerful that no rival could sweep its ships from the world's trading routes, or invade the British Isles. The London government enhanced the private sector by incorporating numerous privately financed London-based companies for establishing trading posts and opening import-export businesses across the world. Each was given a monopoly of trade to the specified geographical region. The first enterprise was the Muscovy Company set up in 1555 to trade with Russia. Other prominent enterprises included the East India Company, and the Hudson's Bay Company in Canada. The Company of Royal Adventurers Trading to Africa had been set up in 1662 to trade in gold, ivory and slaves in Africa; it was reestablished as the Royal African Company in 1672 and focused on the Atlantic slave trade. British involvement in the each of the four major wars, 1740 to 1783, paid off handsomely in terms of trade. Even the loss of the Thirteen Colonies was made up by a very favourable trading relationship with the new United States of America. British gained dominance in the trade with India, and largely dominated the highly lucrative slave, sugar, and commercial trades originating in West Africa and the West Indies. Exports soared from £6.5 million in 1700, to £14.7 million in 1760 and £43.2 million in 1800. Other powers set up similar monopolies on a much smaller scale; only the Netherlands emphasised trade as much as England.