title: ZaSu Pitts

text: The names of her father's sisters, Eliza and Susan, were purportedly the basis for the name "ZaSu", i.e., to satisfy competing family interests. It has been (incorrectly) spelled as Zazu Pitts in some film credits and news articles. Although the name is commonly mispronounced or , or , in her 1963 book "Candy Hits" (pg. 15), published the year of her death, the actress gave the correct pronunciation as "Say Zoo" , recounting that Mary Pickford had predicted "many will mispronounce it", and adding, "How right she was." However, when introducing herself on the September 4, 1952 episode of "I've Got a Secret", she herself pronounced it as Zay-zoo.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: In 1903, when Pitts was nine years old, her family moved to Santa Cruz, California, to seek a warmer climate and better job opportunities. Her childhood home at 208 Lincoln Street still stands. She attended Santa Cruz High School, where she participated in school theatricals.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Pitts made her stage debut in 1914–15 doing school and local community theater in Santa Cruz. Going to Los Angeles in 1916, at the age of 22, she spent many months seeking work as a film extra. Finally, she was discovered for substantive roles in films by screenwriter Frances Marion, who cast Pitts as an orphaned slavey (child of work) in the silent film "A Little Princess" (1917), starring Pickford.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Pitts's popularity grew following a series of Universal one-reeler comedies, and earned her first feature-length lead in King Vidor's "Better Times" (1919). The following year she married her first husband, Tom Gallery, with whom she was paired in several films, including "Heart of Twenty" (1920), "Bright Eyes", "Patsy" (both 1921) and "A Daughter of Luxury" (1922).


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Pitts enjoyed her greatest fame in the early 1930s, often starring in B movies and comedy short films, teamed with Thelma Todd. She played secondary parts in many films. Her stock persona (a fretful, flustered, worried spinster) made her instantly recognizable and was often imitated in cartoons and other films. She starred in a number of Hal Roach short films and features, often in partnership with Thelma Todd as two trouble-prone working girls. At Universal she co-starred in a series of feature-length comedies with Slim Summerville. Switching between comedy short films and features, by the advent of sound, she became a specialist in comedy roles.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: ZaSu Pitts had hidden talents as a dramatic actress. She was given the greatest tragic role of her career in Erich von Stroheim's -hour epic "Greed" (1924). The surprise casting initially shocked Hollywood, but showed that Pitts could draw tears with her doleful demeanor, as well as laughs. Having been extensively edited prior to release — the final theatrical cut ran just over two hours — the movie failed initially at the box office, but has since been restored to over four hours and is considered one of the greatest films ever made. Based on her performance, von Stroheim labeled ZaSu Pitts "the greatest dramatic actress." He also featured her in his films "The Honeymoon" (1928), "The Wedding March" (1928), and "Walking Down Broadway". Pitts's performance in "Walking Down Broadway" was dramatic, with her character showing a repressed romantic interest in her girlfriend; the studio reshot these scenes with Pitts, now playing the girl's companion for laughs, and von Stroheim's directorial credit was removed from the film. The film was finally released in 1933, much changed, as "Hello, Sister!".


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: ZaSu Pitts was so recognizable in comedies that the public didn't take her dramatic efforts seriously. In the classic war drama "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930), Pitts was cast as the distraught mother of young soldier Lew Ayres, but at preview screenings her intense performance drew unintentional laughs. Her scenes were refilmed with Beryl Mercer. In 1936 RKO needed a replacement actress for its Hildegarde Withers series of murder mysteries; Edna May Oliver had left the studio and Helen Broderick succeeded Oliver in the role. Pitts was chosen to succeed Broderick. In theory, it was a good idea: Pitts seemed to fit the role of a prim, spinster schoolmistress. However, mystery fans couldn't accept the fluttery Pitts as a brainy sleuth who matched wits with the police, and after her two Withers films the series was abandoned.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Beginning in the 1930s, Pitts found work in radio. She appeared several times in the earliest "Fibber McGee and Molly" shows, playing a dizzy dame constantly looking for a husband. When Marian Jordan temporarily withdrew from "Fibber McGee and Molly" due to illness, Pitts made guest appearances opposite Jim Jordan as Fibber. Pitts also guested on variety shows, trading banter with Bing Crosby, Al Jolson, W.C. Fields, and Rudy Vallee, among others. She played Miss Mamie Wayne in the soap opera "Big Sister"., and was heard as Miss Pitts on "The New Lum and Abner Show".


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: In 1944, Pitts tackled Broadway, making her debut in the mystery "Ramshackle Inn". The play, written expressly for her, did well, and she took the show on the road in later years. She was also a familiar attraction in summer-stock theaters, playing annually in the Norma Mitchell play "Post Road."


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Postwar films continued to give her the chance to play comic snoops and flighty relatives in such fare as "Life with Father" (1947), but in the 1950s, she started focusing on television. This culminated in her best-known series role, playing second banana to Gale Storm in CBS's "The Gale Storm Show" (1956) (also known as "Oh, Susanna"), in the role of Elvira Nugent ("Nugie"), the shipboard beautician. In 1961, Pitts was cast opposite Earle Hodgins in the episode "Lonesome's Gal" of the ABC sitcom "Guestward, Ho!", set on a dude ranch in New Mexico. In 1962, she appeared in an episode of CBS's "Perry Mason", "The Case of the Absent Artist". Her final role was as Gertie, the switchboard operator in the Stanley Kramer comedy epic "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World" (1963).


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Pitts was married to actor Thomas Sarsfield Gallery from 1920 until their 1933 divorce. Gallery became a Los Angeles boxing promoter and later a TV executive. The couple had two children:


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Declining health dominated Pitts's later years, particularly after she was diagnosed with cancer in the mid-1950s. She continued to work, appearing on TV and making brief appearances in "The Thrill of It All" (1963) and "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World". She died in Hollywood on June 7, 1963, aged 69, and was interred at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City. Pitts wrote a book of candy recipes, "Candy Hits by ZaSu Pitts", which was published posthumously in 1963.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: ZaSu Pitts was inducted to the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 8, 1960, for her contribution to motion pictures. Her star is on the south side of the 6500 block of Hollywood Boulevard.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: In 1994, she was honored with her image on a United States postage stamp along with fellow actors Rudolph Valentino, Clara Bow and Charlie Chaplin as part of The Silent Screen Stars stamp set, designed by caricaturist Al Hirschfeld. Her birthplace of Parsons, Kansas, has a star tile at the entrance to the Parsons Theatre to commemorate her.


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: In the film "Never Give a Sucker an Even Break" (1941), W.C. Fields asks his niece, played by Gloria Jean, "Don't you want to go to school? You want to grow up and be dumb like ZaSu Pitts?" Gloria Jean replied "She only acts like that in pictures. I like her."


title: ZaSu Pitts

text: Actress Mae Questel, who performed character voices in Max Fleischer's Popeye and Betty Boop cartoons, reportedly based the fluttering utterances of Olive Oyl on Pitts.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: Marie Antoinette Riana Graharani (born 13 July 1992), commonly known as The Sacred Riana, is an Indonesian magician and illusionist best known for her performance as a bizarre illusionist.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: She made her television debut as a contestant on Deddy Corbuzier's magic competition show "The Next Mentalist", which premiered on 17 November 2013 and was broadcast on Trans 7. She would go on to become the show's runner-up, successfully attracting the attention of the Indonesian public with her unique appearance.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: In 2017, Riana joined the second season of "Asia's Got Talent" where she was declared the winner after beating the Filipino hip-hop dance group DM-X Comvaleñoz based on the audience votes in the grand final. There have been over 70 million views on Facebook and YouTube of her magic performances onstage.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: In 2018, Riana appeared on season 13 of "America's Got Talent" where she was finished as a quarterfinalist. She was also the second Indonesian to enter "America's Got Talent" live shows after Demian Aditya. On 31 August 2019, Riana took to the "" stage but was eliminated in the first round.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: On 21 August 2018, during the "America's Got Talent" quarterfinals live show, Riana's act was abruptly cut to black and a commercial break before the end of her performance, which confused many viewers about what had just happened and quickly provoked a huge question on social media, but according to a set of production notes which have been posted on Twitter, the dramatic "cut-to-black" moment was actually part of the plan all along.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: In autumn 2022, Riana appeared in La France a un incroyable talent , America's got talent french version.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: Riana has appeared on several television shows or joined several talent search shows as a guest or contestant and later became a judge in The Great Magician show. In 2019, Riana made her film debut by playing as herself in "", which was released on 14 March 2019.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: Riana's gimmick is a reference to Sadako in the Japanese horror classic "The Ring", with a similarity to her long hair falling in front of her face, while her doll calls to mind Annabelle from "The Conjuring" film.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: Riana and her manager chose "The Sacred" name because they think that doing magic is a sacred thing for some people.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: Riana has a distinctive appearance, characterized by head and hand twitching movement, always stands with one of her legs bent and a flat facial expression. Riana always appears with long and loose hair that covers most of her face.


title: The Sacred Riana

text: In each stage appearance, Riana wears a long-sleeved dress and white tights and also holds her doll, Riani, which wears the same style of clothing as the magician. When she speaks during performances, she does so in a quavering and unclear voice.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Antiques Roadshow is a British television programme broadcast by the BBC in which antiques appraisers travel to various regions of the United Kingdom (and occasionally in other countries) to appraise antiques brought in by local people (generally speaking). It has been running since 1979, based on a 1977 documentary programme.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The series has spawned many international versions throughout Europe, North America and other countries with the same TV format. The program is hosted by Fiona Bruce and it is in its 45th series.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The programme began as a BBC documentary that aired in 1977, about a London auction house doing a tour of the West Country in England. The pilot roadshow was recorded in Hereford on 17 May 1977 and presented by contributor Bruce Parker, a presenter of the news/current affairs programme "Nationwide", and antiques expert Arthur Negus, who had previously worked on a similarly themed show, called "Going for a Song". The pilot was so successful that it was transmitted and the format has remained almost unchanged ever since. Negus appeared on "Antiques Roadshow" until 1983. In the original BBC programme, various towns or famous places are advertised as venues. The show has since visited a number of other countries (including Canada in 2001 and Australia in 2005) and has been imitated by other TV production companies around the world.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In the United Kingdom, annual children's Christmas specials aired from 1991 until 2006, under the title "Antiques Roadshow: The Next Generation" (except for the 1991 edition, which was titled "Antiques Roadshow Going Live") and used a specially reworked version of the regular theme music. However, there was no children's special in 2007; instead an edition was devoted to "antiques of the future" dating from the 1950s to the present day. Since then individually themed specials have been aired, though not every year.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: A spin-off programme, "20th Century Roadshow", focusing on modern collectibles, aired between April and June 2005. It was hosted by Alan Titchmarsh. Two other spin-off programmes, "Antiques Roadshow Gems" (1991) and "Priceless Antiques Roadshow" (2009–10), revisited items from the show's history and provided background information on the making of the show and interviews with the programme's experts.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In the 1980s, a girl wrote in to "Jim'll Fix It" to ask if Jimmy Savile would "fix it" for her to "accidentally" drop and smash a seemingly valuable vase in an episode of the show. This was broadcast as part of a regular edition, as well as in the "Jim'll Fix It" episode, with many of the "Roadshow" spectators looking on in astonishment, until antiques expert David Battie, who retired in 2020, explained the ruse.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The most valuable item to ever appear on the show featured on 16 November 2008. This was an original 1990s maquette of the "Angel of the North" sculpture by Antony Gormley, owned by Gateshead Council, which was valued at £1,000,000 by Philip Mould. Glassware expert Andy McConnell later valued a collection of chandeliers at seven million pounds (their actual insurance value), noting as he did so that this beat Mould's record; however these were fixtures of the building in which the show was being filmed (Bath Assembly Rooms) rather than an item that had been brought in. In reality, the two most expensive objects to be sold as a result of being discovered on the show are the 1932 camera found by Marc Allum, which realised over $600,000 (US) in 2013 and the Christofle et Cie Japonisme jardiniere filmed by Eric Knowles, which sold for £668,450 (including buyers premium).


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Conversely, many items brought before the experts are without commercial value, if not outright counterfeits. They are seldom shown in the broadcast episodes, to spare embarrassment for the individuals involved, although counterfeit objects are sometimes included, to give experts an opportunity to explain the difference between real and fake items. Value is not the only criterion for inclusion; items with an interesting story attached, or of a provenance relevant to the show's location, will often be featured regardless of value. An episode commemorating the end of the First World War and featuring personal mementoes, included no valuations. All items are appraised, although most appraisals take place off-camera, with only the most promising items (around 50 on an average day) being filmed, of which about 20 appear in the final programme.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Some significant items have been acquired by museums after being sold once their owners were appraised of their true value. An example is the watercolour painting "The Artist's Halt in the Desert" by Richard Dadd, discovered and shown by Peter Nahum in 1986 and purchased the next year by the British Museum for £100,000. Another such item, later dubbed "Ozzy the Owl", is a Staffordshire slipware jug, valued by Henry Sandon on a 1990 show at £20,000 to £30,000, and subsequently acquired by Potteries Museum & Art Gallery.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The original theme music was Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 (for several years in a Moog synthesiser version by Wendy Carlos), but was changed in the early 1990s to an original piece. This theme was written by Paul Reade and Tim Gibson and published by Air Edel.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Visitors (predominantly from the area being visited by the show) bring along their possessions to be evaluated for authenticity and interest (especially related to the venue) and an approximate valuation is given. The production team selects the items whose appraisal is to be televised. Often, the professional evaluators give a rather in-depth historical, craft, or artistic context to the item, adding a very strong cultural element to the show. This increases the show's appeal to people interested in the study of the past or some particular crafts, or certain arts, regardless of the monetary value of the objects. At the core, however, the focus of the production is on the interplay between the owner and the evaluator.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: "Antiques Roadshow" has a team of experts numbering over 60. Many have areas of speciality, some of them are long tenuring experts on the programme.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Episodes are usually filmed during the spring and summer and aired the following autumn and winter (into the following year). Each location visited is covered by one or two (exceptionally even three) episodes.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In 2005, part of the BBC team visited Australia and produced six one-hour episodes in conjunction with The LifeStyle Channel (XYZnetworks). These were titled "Antiques Roadshow Australia". A special was also made about the visit to Australia, entitled "Antiques Roadshow Australia: Behind the Scenes".


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In Flanders, VTM has been broadcasting a local version, called "Rijker dan je denkt?" ("Richer than you thought?") since 2012, which is hosted by .


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In Canada, "Canadian Antiques Roadshow" – a programme based on the British and American versions - debuted in January 2005 on CBC Television and CBC Newsworld. The show has also been aired on CBC Country Canada. It was hosted by Valerie Pringle.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The most expensive item featured was Henry Nelson O'Neil's "Eastward Ho!" oil on canvas. Recommended insurance: CDN$500,000, later sold at Sotheby's in London for GB£164,800 (about CDN$300,000 at the 2008 exchange rate).


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The Finnish version, known as "Antiikkia, antiikkia", ("Antiques, antiques"), has been running on YLE TV1 since 1997.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In Germany, various versions are broadcast regularly on the public regional channels of the ARD, the oldest being the BR production "Kunst und Krempel" ("Art and Junk"), airing since 1985. Other versions include "Lieb & teuer" ("Near & dear"), shown on NDR, "Kitsch oder Kunst?" ("Kitsch or Art?"), shown on HR, and "Echt Antik?!" ("Genuinely antique?!"), shown on SWR.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The show "Tussen Kunst & Kitsch" ("Between Art & Kitsch") has been running in the Netherlands since 1984. First shown on AVRO, the programme is usually set in a museum somewhere in the Netherlands, sometimes in Belgium and Germany. Due to its popularity, special episodes have been made in which the experts take the viewers on "cultural art excursions" to places of great importance in the history of art.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In 2011, a painting of Joost van Geel with the title "Het Kantwerkstertje" ("The Little Lacemaker") was discovered with an estimated value of 250,000 euros, the highest-appraised item on the show. The programme has been presented by (1984-2002), (2002-2015), and (2015-), and it celebrated its 30th series in 2014.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The Swedish version started out as a co-production between SVT Malmö and the BBC, whose "Antiques Roadshow" visited Scandinavia for two programmes. "Antikrundan" ("Antiques Round"), its Swedish version, premiered in August 1989 on TV2, and SVT has produced a new season every year since.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: As of 2019, 30 seasons have been shown and most of the experts have been with the programme since its start. Jesper Aspegren was the original host. He left in 2000, and from the 2001 season onwards, Antikrundan has been hosted by Anne Lundberg.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The BBC original is also run on Swedish television, under the name "Engelska Antikrundan" (""English Antiques Round"").


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: American public broadcaster PBS created a show in 1997 inspired by the Antiques Roadshow. The American version of "Antiques Roadshow" is produced by WGBH, a PBS member station in Boston, Massachusetts. Mark Walberg is host and Marsha Bemko is executive producer.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: PBS also airs the original BBC programme, though it is called "Antiques Roadshow UK" to differentiate it from the PBS version. Values of items in United States dollars are often superimposed over the pound sterling values given in the original broadcast.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Hugh Scully hosted a Beaulieu based show on 3 January 1993, a Jamaican based show on 14 February 1993, a Cork based show on 13 February 1994 and a Brussels based show on 16 April 1995, all on the BBC.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Fiona Bruce together with individual "Antiques Roadshow" appraisers investigate the history of significant items, uncovering the stories that form the history of family heirlooms and finding out about their origin and authenticity.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: In Sweden it was shown on SVT in Autumn 2018 under the name of "Engelska Antikrundan: Arvegodsens hemligheter" (""English Round of Antiques: The Secrets of the Heirlooms"").


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: Ellen E Jones of "The Independent" called the first episode, about a Cromwellian escutcheon, "a welcome addition to the schedules".


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: The BBC published a monthly "Homes & Antiques" magazine until 2011, which offered behind-the-scenes insights into "Antiques Roadshow", as well as offering tips and advice on buying and evaluating antiques. This magazine still exists, now published by Immediate since 2015.


title: Antiques Roadshow

text: There is also a spin-off magazine of the American version of the show called "Antiques Roadshow Insider", which gives fans an inside look at the show as well as offering special features about antiques and collectibles from the programme itself.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: A dropped ceiling is a secondary ceiling, hung below the main (structural) ceiling. It may also be referred to as a drop ceiling, T-bar ceiling, false ceiling, suspended ceiling, grid ceiling, drop in ceiling, drop out ceiling, or ceiling tiles and is a staple of modern construction and architecture in both residential and commercial applications.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Dropped ceilings and ceiling tiles were used in Japan for aesthetic reasons as early as the Muromachi Period (1337 to 1573). These could be made with simple planks, or coffered. Blackfriars Theatre in London, England, built in 1596, had dropped ceilings to aid acoustics.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: U. S. Patent No. 1,470,728 for modern dropped ceilings was applied for by E. E. Hall on May 28, 1919, and granted on October 16, 1923. Initially modern dropped ceilings were built using interlocking tiles and the only way to provide access for repair or inspection of the area above the tiles was by starting at the edge of the ceiling, or at a designated "key tile", and then removing contiguous tiles one at a time until the desired place of access was reached. Once the repair or inspection was completed, the tiles had to be reinstalled. This process could be time-consuming and expensive. On September 8, 1958, Donald A. Brown of Westlake, Ohio, filed for a patent for "Accessible Suspended Ceiling Construction". This invention provided suspended ceiling construction in which access may readily be obtained at any desired location. Patent Number US 2,984,946 A was granted on May 23, 1961. Brown has sometimes been credited as being the inventor of the dropped ceiling even though other patents preceded his as shown in the table below.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Effective building design requires balancing multiple objectives: aesthetics, acoustics, environmental factors, and integration with the building's infrastructure—not to mention cost of construction as well as long-term operation costs.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Modern dropped ceilings were initially created to hide the building infrastructure, including piping, wiring, and/or ductwork, by creating a plenum space above the dropped ceiling, while allowing access for repairs and inspections. Drop ceilings may also be used to hide problems, such as structural damage. Further, drop out ceilings can also conceal the sprinkler systems while still providing full fire suppression functionality.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: For many years, dropped ceilings were made of basic white tiles, but modern innovations now offer a plethora of options in sizes, colors, materials (including retro designs and faux leather, wood, or metal), visual effects and shapes, patterns, and textures as well as support systems and ways to access the plenum. Custom runs of specialty ceiling tiles can be done at relatively low cost compared with the past.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Acoustic balance and control was another early objective of dropped ceilings. A noisy room can overstimulate occupants, while a too quiet interior may seem dull and uninviting.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: The acoustic performance of suspended ceilings has improved dramatically over the years, with enhanced sound absorption and attenuation. This is sometimes achieved by adding insulation known as Sound Attenuation Batts (SABs), more commonly referred to as "sound batts", above the panels to help deaden sounds and keep adjacent rooms quieter.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Indoor environmental quality includes ventilation, VOC emissions, lighting and thermal system control, thermal comfort, use of daylight for natural illumination, acoustics, and optimization of outdoor view availability.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Many manufacturers of modern dropped ceilings include sustainability as an objective. Sustainable features may include:


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Integration with mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) is important with dropped ceilings, since most of these systems are by definition above the ceiling. Fortunately, most ceiling system products are now designed with this integration in mind. Decisions here can also affect aesthetics as well as access and maintenance.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: A typical dropped ceiling consists of a gridwork of metal channels in the shape of an upside-down "T", suspended on wires from the overhead structure. These channels snap together in a regularly spaced pattern of cells. Each cell is then filled with lightweight ceiling tiles or "panels" which simply drop into the grid. The primary grid types are "Standard 1" (-inch face), Slimline (-inch grid), and concealed grid.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In the United States and its neighboring countries, the cell size in the suspension grids is typically either or , and the ceiling tiles, light fixtures, and fluorescent light tubes are the same size. In Europe, the cell size in the suspension grids is 600×600 mm, while the ceiling tiles and fixtures are slightly (5 mm) smaller at 595×595 mm or 595×1195 mm, and the T5 fluorescent and LED tubes are shorter by 37 mm to allow for easier and safer insertion and removal without breakage.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: An older, less common type of dropped ceiling is the "concealed grid" system, which uses a method of interlocking panels into one another and the grid with the use of small strips of metal called 'splines', thus making it difficult to remove panels to gain access above the ceiling without damaging the installation or the panels. Normally, they have a "key panel" (usually in the corner) that can be removed, allowing for the other panels to be slid out of the grid (a series of metal channels called "z bars") one by one, until eventually removing the desired panel. This type of ceiling is more commonly found in older installations or installations where access to above the ceiling is generally considered unnecessary.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: This system has some major disadvantages, compared to the more common "drop panel" system, most notably the difficulty in removing and reattaching panels from the grid, which, in some cases, can cause irreparable damage to the panels removed. Finding replacement panels for this type of dropped ceiling is becoming increasingly more difficult as the demand for them and the production of parts slow. Small clips are still available that allow tiles to be inserted into gaps in the ceiling where a tile is missing and work by being placed on the edge of a concealed tile and then being slid along as the tile is placed to "lock" it in place.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: With similar advantages to a dropped ceiling, a stretch ceiling is often used to conceal pipework, wires or the existing ceiling. There is also usually a broad choice of colour or texture, and the membrane can be manipulated into a variety of shapes.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: When a stretch ceiling is being installed, semi-concealed plastic/aluminum track, the preferred choice for most architects and designers, is cut to size and fixed to the perimeter of the ceiling area. The membrane is stretched and the harpoon or catch edge is clipped into the track. Stretching is aided by heating up the membrane or sheet prior to fitting.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Approved drop out (or drop-out) ceilings allow the installation of a dropped ceiling beneath existing fire sprinklers because the tiles, sometimes called melt-out ceiling tiles, are heat-sensitive and are designed to fall from the dropped ceiling suspension grid during a fire, allowing the sprinklers to spray their water.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Drop out ceiling tiles can add to the aesthetic appeal of a ceiling since the fire sprinklers are hidden by the tiles. Commonly made from vinyl or expanded polystyrene, drop out ceiling tiles are available in multiple sizes and finishes from a variety of manufacturers.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Installation is subject to the local Authority Having Jurisdiction (AHJ) and, in the United States, must meet the standards listed in the section below at a minimum.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: The following standards are in addition to those for ceiling tiles in general. No clips, fasteners, or impediments of any kind can be used to limit the ceiling tile's ability to drop from the suspension system without restraint in the event of a fire unless they have been used in the testing process. Painting can void an approval, and additional local requirements may exist.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In older buildings, the space above the dropped ceiling was often used as a plenum space for ventilation systems, requiring only enclosed ducts that deliver fresh air into the room below, with return air entering the ceiling space through open grilles across the ceiling. That practice is now used less frequently in new buildings.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: If the dropped ceiling is used as a plenum, low-voltage cables and wiring that are not installed inside conduit must use a special low-smoke and low-toxicity wire insulation, which will tend to char and stop burning on its own. That helps to protect building occupants so that they are not poisoned with toxic chemicals sucked through the ventilation system during a fire, and it helps to prevent fires from spreading inside the hidden plenum space. The special low-smoke cable is typically referred to as plenum cable or Low Smoke Zero Halogen (LSZH or LS0H) cable. While twisted pair cable for networking and telephone service is the most common form of plenum cable, coaxial cable also needs to be plenum-rated for safety.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: High-voltage electrical equipment (generally regarded as being over 50 V) is not permitted to be exposed in the plenum space above a drop ceiling but must be enclosed in conduit or raceways and be physically isolated from low-voltage wiring. High-voltage electrical devices similarly must be enclosed in a plenum space, inside a metallic container. Similarly, electrical outlets for domestic powered devices may not be inside the plenum space, but outlets can be installed on ceiling tiles inside electrical boxes, with the sockets exposed on the exterior bottom face of the drop ceiling. The purpose of these restrictions is to limit flame spread inside the unseen plenum space, in the event of high voltage equipment or wiring failure. Low-voltage cabling is permitted because current flow is typically negligible and so the risk of overheating and fire is limited.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In earthquake prone areas, such as California, diagonal wire stays are often required by building codes to prevent the ceiling grid from swaying laterally during an earthquake, which can lead to partial or total collapse of the ceiling grid on the occupants below during a severe tremor. Compression posts may also be added to keep the ceiling from bouncing vertically during an earthquake.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Lighting fixtures and other devices installed in a dropped ceiling must be firmly secured to the dropped ceiling framework. A fire above a dropped ceiling often requires firefighters to pull down the ceiling in a hurry for quick access to the conflagration. Loose fixtures resting in the framework only by gravity may become unseated, swing down on their armorflex power cables, and hit the firefighters below. Binding the fixtures to the framework assures that if the framework must be pulled down, the fixture will come down with it and not become a pendulous swinging hazard to the firefighters.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: To address fire safety, ceiling tiles made from mineral fibres, plastic, tin, composite, or fire-rated wood panels can be used within the construction to meet acceptable standards/ratings. Some tiles, in specific situations, can provide the needed additional resistance to meet the "time rating" required for various fire code, city ordinance, commercial, or other similar building construction regulations. Fire ratings for ceiling panels vary based on the materials used, the preparation of each panel, and the safety testing and third party evaluation done to determine where and how they can be safely installed. In the United Kingdom, tiles from certain manufacturers may be required to be clipped into the grid with special ceiling clips to provide a fire rating; there are special tiles designed for the underside of mezzanine floors however that can give a fire rating without being clipped.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Drop out ceilings have a further advantage since they can be mounted underneath fire sprinklers, thus hiding the sprinklers for a more attractive appearance. When they are installed under fire sprinklers, materials, applications, installation, and maintenance of drop out ceilings may be necessary to comply with fire safety regulations. (The white paper "Drop-out Ceiling Panels–A Discussion on Their Use With Fire Sprinklers", referenced by the article, is available here)


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Another advantage of a dropped ceiling is that the easily-removed ceiling panels offer instant access to the plenum, which greatly simplifies repairs or alterations.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Wiring and piping installed behind traditional plaster or wallboard ceilings are extremely difficult to modify once the finished ceiling is in place. Wires must be fished through hollow spaces in the walls behind the finished ceiling, or the ceiling must be demolished for changes to wiring or piping to be made.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In contrast, the tiles and other parts of a dropped or stretch ceiling can be easily removed to allow access to the area above the grid to do any necessary wiring or plumbing modifications. In remodeling, nearly all components of the grid can be dismantled and reassembled elsewhere.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In office buildings, drop ceilings are often used in conjunction with hollow steel studs to construct small office spaces out of a much larger cavernous space. Wiring and other services are run through the open ceiling, down through the hollow stud walls, and to outlets in the work areas. If business needs change, the office spaces can be easily dismantled, with the overall cavernous space reconfigured with a different floor plan.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: In older buildings that have had multiple renovations, a dropped ceiling has often been installed in one renovation and then subsequently removed in another since its installation having been an inexpensive fix to prolong the time between major renovations.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: One disadvantage with this ceiling system is the reduced headroom. Clearance is required between the grid and any pipes or duct work above to install the ceiling tiles and light fixtures. In general, a minimum clearance of is often needed between the lowest obstruction and the level of the ceiling grid. A direct-mount grid may work for those who want the convenience of a dropped ceiling but have limited headroom. Stretch ceiling supports require less than one inch of vertical space, and no space is required for tiles to be lifted out with a stretch ceiling, but a greater clearance space may be chosen to allow room for MEC or for aesthetic reasons.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Dropped ceilings generally conceal many of the functional and structural elements of a building, which creates an aesthetic paradigm that discourages the use of functional building systems as aesthetic design elements. Concealing such elements makes the complexity of today's advanced building technologies more difficult to appreciate. It is also more difficult to perform maintenance on or diagnose problems with the concealed systems. It is common practice in commercial and office settings to install drop ceilings in older buildings which were not designed for modern HVAC, electrical, or fire suppression systems in mind. These renovations are oftentimes criticized for covering up aesthetically appealing structural elements of older buildings.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: As a renovation tool, dropped ceilings are a quick and inexpensive way to repair a ceiling and to reduce HVAC costs. Some materials may show their age quickly. For example, mineral fiber sags are damaged easily when handled and stain easily and permanently, but stretch ceiling, tin, and vinyl do not have such characteristics.


title: Dropped ceiling

text: Owing to their popularity in the mid-20th century, many older drop ceilings incorporated Asbestos for its insulating and fire-resistant properties. These can pose a serious health hazard to occupants and especially workers if the asbestos-containing elements are not properly removed.


title: United States Junior Chamber

text: The United States Junior Chamber, also known as the Jaycees, JCs or JCI USA, is a leadership training, service organization and civic organization for people between the ages of 18 and 40. It is a branch of Junior Chamber International (JCI). Areas of emphasis are business development, management skills, individual training, community service, and international connections. The U.S. Junior Chamber is a not-for-profit corporation/organization as described under Internal Revenue Code 501(c)(4).


title: United States Junior Chamber

text: Established as the United States Junior Chamber of Commerce on January 21, 1920, it provided opportunities for young men to develop personal and leadership skills through service to others. The Jaycees later expanded to include women after the United States Supreme Court ruled in the 1984 case "Roberts v. United States Jaycees" that Minnesota could prohibit sex discrimination in private organizations. The following year, 1985, marked the final year of the U.S. Jaycee Women (also known as Jayceettes or Jayceens), an organization that lasted 10 years and at its convention in 1984 in Atlanta boasted 59,000 members.


title: United States Junior Chamber

text: At its membership peak in 1976, the U.S. Jaycees boasted a membership total of 356,000 men between the ages of 18 and 35. Rules were later changed to allow members to stay active until age 40.


title: United States Junior Chamber

text: The Jaycee Creed was adopted in 1946 at the United States Junior Chamber of Commerce National Convention.


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: "Baby, I Love Your Way" is a song written and performed by English singer Peter Frampton, released as a single in September 1975. It first featured on Frampton's 1975 album, "Frampton", where it segues from the previous track "Nassau".


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: A live version of the song was later released on his 1976 multi-platinum album "Frampton Comes Alive!", where it gained popularity as a hit song, peaking at number 12 on the US "Billboard" Hot 100 chart. It also reached number three in Canada.


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: "Billboard" described the live version as an "easy rocker" and said that the portion of the song where Frampton sings the title lyrics made "an effective hook." "Cash Box" called it "an excellent tune" explaining that "primarily, this is an acoustic tune, and Frampton sings with sensitivity over the soft backing."


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: In 2017, Frampton discussed this song while talking to Washington D.C. lawmakers about inequitable revenue payments from streaming music services like iTunes and Spotify. "For 55 million streams of 'Baby I Love Your Way', I got $1,700," said Frampton. "Their jaws dropped and they asked me to repeat that for them."


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: The American neo-disco group Will to Power recorded a medley of "Baby, I Love Your Way" and "Free Bird", which reached No. 1 in the US.


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: The American reggae/pop band Big Mountain released a cover of the song in February 1994, which appeared on the soundtrack of the film "Reality Bites", starring Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke and Ben Stiller. This version achieved major worldwide success, reaching number six on the US "Billboard" Hot 100 and number two on the UK Singles Chart (being kept off the top spot by "Love is All Around" by Wet Wet Wet). The single reached the top ten in many countries across Europe, including topping the charts of Denmark, Spain, and Sweden. It also reached the top five in Australia and New Zealand, as well as in Canada, where it reached number two.


title: Baby, I Love Your Way

text: Larry Flick from "Billboard" magazine reviewed the song favorably, calling it an "earthy rendition" which is "right in the pocket of current trends." Dr. Bayyan from "Cash Box" wrote, "This song deals with the beauty of the subject that the group is focusing on. The lyrics are very intense and spiritual and are enhanced by the raw string and wind instruments which captivate the imagination." Ron Fell and Diane Rufer from the "Gavin Report" noted that this cover "has teeth" and "could be big." Pan-European magazine "Music & Media" commented, "Another '70s pop classic has come out of the reggae grinder to enjoy its second youth in the '90s. Peter Frampton wrote it, not knowing that one day it would appear in the "Reality Bites" film." Alan Jones from "Music Week" gave it four out of five, adding that "this is a lightweight reggae cover", and it "is definitely in a summery mood."


title: Raymond Lam

text: Raymond Lam (; Jyutping: lam4 fung1; born 8 December 1979) is a Hong Kong actor and singer who is best known for roles in the television dramas "A Step into the Past", "Twin of Brothers", "Moonlight Resonance", "Highs and Lows" and "Line Walker" and was dubbed the King of Chok after his role in "The Mysteries of Love".


title: Raymond Lam

text: Raymond Lam was born in Xiamen, China, on 8 December 1979, but moved to Hong Kong at the age of 2. His father, Lam Kwok-Wah (林國華), is a real-estate property developer in the mainland referred to as "Xiamen's Li Ka-shing" (廈門李嘉誠; ) who sits on the board of seven real estate and construction companies.


title: Raymond Lam

text: While his first languages are Cantonese and Hokkien, Lam studied in Kiangsu and Chekiang Primary School, a primarily Mandarin-speaking primary school in pre-Handover Hong Kong and is thus also fluent in Mandarin and English. Raymond Lam's childhood dream was to become a professional singer and dancer. He studied in St. Paul's College, Hong Kong for Secondary School. Following that, he studied architecture in Xiamen University for 1st Year, and then completed the rest at University of Southern California, majoring in architecture and minoring in music.


title: Raymond Lam

text: Lam attended the 13th TVB artists training class in 1998 as an auditing student and was offered a contract with TVB upon graduation in September 1998. In the earlier part of his career, Lam appeared as a walk-on in numerous television series and as a host for TVB8.


title: Raymond Lam

text: Lam rose to fame for his portrayal of the ruthless Qin Shi Huang in the historical/science fiction drama "A Step into the Past" (2001). He was then offered his first lead role in "Eternal Happiness" (2002). In 2003, Lam won the TVB Anniversary Award for "Most Improved Male Artiste" for his performance in the legal drama, "Survivor's Law".


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2004, Lam gained fame in China for his role as Kou Chong in "Twin of Brothers", and won several awards.


title: Raymond Lam

text: After a one-year hiatus in 2005 due to inner conflicts in TVB, Lam made his comeback in "La Femme Desperado" (2006), which became the highest rated drama of the year.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2007, Lam was cast in "The Drive of Life", a grand production by TVB to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Hong Kong reunification.


title: Raymond Lam

text: The following year, Lam returned to star in the "Moonlight Resonance", the sequel to "Heart of Greed". The series was met with critical acclaim, and subsequently became the highest rated Hong Kong drama since 1991.


title: Raymond Lam

text: Also in 2008, Lam starred in the wuxia drama "The Four". His portrayal of the character "Wu Qing" was met with critical acclaim from fans of the original novel by Woon Swee Oan. This was followed by a starring role in the martial arts series "The Master of Tai Chi", for which he won "Best Actor" at the Asian Television Awards.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2010, Lam starred in "The Mysteries of Love", where he portrayed a genius physics professor. Lam's portrayal of a professor was described by audience using the slang word "Chok", which means "cool or handsome, to the point of electrifying". Lam stated that he thinks the word means "professional/serious" instead. Subsequently, the term went viral and Lam was named as the "King of Chok".


title: Raymond Lam

text: The same year, Lam also made his foray into films, starring in "Perfect Wedding" with Miriam Yeung and "The Jade and the Pearl" with Charlene Choi.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2011, Lam starred in the Chinese film "The Sorcerer and the White Snake", portraying Xu Xian. The film was one of the top 5 grossing Chinese films of the year, and Lam was ranked on Forbes China Celebrity List for the first time.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2012, Lam played a policeman for the first time in "Highs and Lows". "High and Lows" was the most watched Hong Kong drama in China that year, and Lam won "Best Actor" at the Huading Awards. The same year, Lam starred in the comedy film, "Love Is...Pyjamas". The same year, he took on the role of Zhuge Liang in the time-travel historical drama, "Three Kingdoms RPG".


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2013, Lam starred in "Saving General Yang", portraying the fifth son Yang Yande. He also headlined the horror film, "Baby Blues". On the small screen, he starred in historical drama, "Loved in the Purple".


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2014, he portrayed Han Wudi in the drama "The Virtuous Queen of Han", which won him the "Top 10 Most Popular Actor" award at the 9th Chinese TV Audience Festival. He also starred in the hit Hong Kong drama, "Line Walker" (使徒行者). His character Sit Ka-keung "Bao Seed" was praised by critics for being the "soul/essence" of the drama. His onscreen partnership with Charmaine Sheh was also favoured by viewers. He became a stronger contender for "Best Actor" award in 2014 TVB Anniversary Awards. Lam won the "Best Actor" award at the 15th Huading Awards for his performance in both dramas.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2015, Lam portrayed Lu Xiaofeng in the wuxia drama, "Detectives and Doctors". He is the fourth Chinese actor to portray the character, and was praised by critics for being the most outstanding Lu Xiaofeng.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2016, Lam starred in the wuxia drama, "Six Doors", acting as a constable detective. In 2017, Lam starred in the palace drama, "Rule The World", playing Huang Taiji.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2018, Lam is set to star in "The Legends of Monkey King", playing the titular Sun Wukong. He was also cast in the police procedural drama, "Police Tactical Unit".


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2019, Raymond Lam announced he would be working with TVB and The Voice Entertainment Group (星夢娛樂) during the press conference of TVB Homecoming on 17 March 2019.


title: Raymond Lam

text: Apart from his acting career, Lam also performed some of the theme songs for the television series he acted in. In 2007, Lam signed on with EEG under its Music Plus Label, and released his debut album, "Finding Love in Memories", on 23 November. The title track of the album served as one of the theme songs for TVB's "The Drive of Life".


title: Raymond Lam

text: On September 10, 2008, Lam released his second album "Your Love". The album secured a double IFPI Platinum Award. A song from the album, "Love With No Regrets", became the theme song of "Moonlight Resonance", and won many awards including the Gold Song award at the Top Ten Chinese Gold Songs Award and Jade Solid Gold Awards Presentation.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2009, Lam released his third album "Let's Get Wet" and stepped on the Hong Kong Coliseum for his first concert, held on 17 and 18 June.


title: Raymond Lam

text: On March 4, 2011, Lam released his first Mandarin album "First". On July 22, 2011, Lam released his sixth album "LF", which includes the hit single "CHOK".


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2012, Lam continued his "Light up my Live" World Tour at other countries such as Macau and several cities in America.


title: Raymond Lam

text: On 26 January 2013, Lam held his fourth concert and world tour, "A Time 4 You", with his eighth album of the same name released one day before the concert.


title: Raymond Lam

text: In 2016, Lam released his ninth album, "Trap". From 29 April until 1 May 2016, Lam held his fifth concert, "Heart Attack LF Live In HK".


title: Raymond Lam

text: Lam has signed with TVB’s record label, Voice Entertainment on March 17th,2019. Also, in 2020 will be Lam’s 20th debut anniversary, and he plans on doing a concert tour to commemorate it


title: Raymond Lam

text: On May 20 2021, Weibo Starlight Awards 2020 ceremony was held online. The winners were all over the world, including Lam, Louis Koo, Takuya Kimura and his two daughters, Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, , etc.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Carlos, Prince of Asturias, also known as Don Carlos (8 July 154524 July 1568), was the eldest son and heir apparent of King Philip II of Spain. His mother was Maria Manuela of Portugal, daughter of John III of Portugal. Carlos was mentally unstable and was imprisoned by his father in early 1568, dying after half a year of solitary confinement. His fate was a theme in Spain's Black Legend, and inspired a play by Friedrich Schiller and an opera by Giuseppe Verdi.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Carlos was born at Valladolid on 8 July 1545, the son of the double first cousins Philip of Spain and María Manuela of Portugal. His paternal grandfather, Emperor Charles V, was the reigning king of Spain. Carlos's mother Maria died four days after the birth of her son from a haemorrhage she had following the birth.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The young Infante Carlos was delicate and deformed. He grew up proud and willful and, as a young adult, began to show signs of mental instability. Many of his physical and psychological disabilities may have stemmed from the inbreeding common to his family, the House of Habsburg, and the royal houses of Portugal (House of Aviz) and Spain. Carlos had only four great-grandparents instead of the maximum of eight, and his parents had the same coefficient of co-ancestry (1/4) as if they were half siblings. He also had only six great-great-grandparents, instead of the maximum 16; his maternal grandmother and his paternal grandfather were siblings, his maternal grandfather and his paternal grandmother were also siblings, and his two great-grandmothers were sisters.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Carlos lost his mother four days after his birth. He was raised by his aunts and, after their marriages, with other family members. According to the courtesan Gramiz, Carlos was spoiled, emotionally unstable, and not very bright. He was educated in the Universidad de Alcalá de Henares along with Juan of Austria and Alexander Farnese.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The descriptions of his behaviour suggest that he had serious mental problems. Rumour in the Spanish court had it that he enjoyed roasting animals alive and on one occasion blinded all the horses in the royal stables . At age eleven he ordered the whipping of a serving girl for no known reason. The Venetian ambassador, Hieronymo Soranzo, thought that Carlos was "ugly and repulsive" and once tried to force a shoemaker to eat shoes Carlos had found unsatisfactory. Another Venetian, Paolo Tiepolo, wrote: "He [Prince Carlos] wished neither to study nor to take physical exercise, but only to harm others."


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: José Luis Gonzalo Sánchez-Molero has tried to argue that those reports were just rumours, based on his investigations regarding Carlos's personal library – even though there is no guarantee that he read the books in it. From 1554, Juan was in charge of both his education and his library. His library was filled with books on Spanish history, Aragonese history, Portuguese history, mathematics, astronomy, and cartography. He had no books in Latin, which was strange given his age and rank, but he had various books in Portuguese and started learning German in 1566. It is suggested that the 1562 accident did not damage his intellectual ability, even though this is unclear.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: In 1556, Emperor Charles V abdicated and retired to the Monastery of Yuste in southern Spain, leaving the Spanish holdings of his empire to his son, Philip, Carlos's father. The former emperor died in 1558, and the following year, Prince Carlos was betrothed to Elizabeth of Valois, eldest daughter of King Henry II of France. However, for political reasons, and his father's mistrust of Carlos's temper, she instead married his father, King Philip, in 1560.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: His health was always weak. At age 14 he fell ill with malaria, which provoked severe deformations in his legs and spinal column. In 1561 the doctors of the court recommended that he move permanently to Alcalá de Henares for his health, as the climate was milder. Carlos constantly complained about his father's resistance to giving him positions of authority. Finally, the King gave him a position in the Council of Castile and another in the Council of Aragon. This only made Carlos more furious, since both organisations were important but ultimately consultative. He showed no interest in the councils or in familiarising himself with political matters through them.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Three other brides were then suggested for the Prince: Mary, Queen of Scots; Margaret of Valois, youngest daughter of Henry II of France; and Anna of Austria, who was later to become Philip's fourth wife, and was a daughter of Philip's cousin, Emperor Maximilian II and Philip's sister Maria. It was agreed in 1564 that Carlos should marry Anna. His father promised him rule over the Low Countries in 1559, before his accident, but Carlos's growing mental instability after it, along with his demonstrations of sadism, made his father hesitate and ultimately change his mind, which enraged Carlos further.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The 15-year-old Carlos was recognised in 1560 as the heir-apparent to the Castilian throne, and three years later as heir-apparent to the Crown of Aragon as well. Also, had he lived until the onset of the Portuguese succession crisis two decades later, he would have had a better claim to the Portuguese throne (in the aftermath of the extinction of the House of Aviz) than his father as he was the eldest surviving grandson of King John III of Portugal. Because of his eminence, he often attended meetings of the Council of State (which dealt with foreign affairs) and was in correspondence with his aunt Margaret, who governed the Low Countries in his father's name.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: In 1562, he sustained a serious head injury falling downstairs while chasing a serving girl. The prince was close to death, in terrible pain and experiencing delusions. After trying all sorts of remedies, including doctors of all types, healers, and even the relics of Diego de Alcalá, his life was saved by a trepanation of the skull, performed by the eminent anatomist Andreas Vesalius. After his recovery, Carlos became even wilder, more unstable in his temper and unpredictable in his behaviour. His father was forced to move him away from any position of power. He took a dislike to the Duke of Alba, who became the commander of Philip's forces in the Netherlands, a position that had been promised to Carlos.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: His frustration and mental problems were useful for the rebel factions in the Low Countries. In 1565, Carlos made contacts with a representative of Count Egmont and Philip of Montmorency, from the Low Countries, who were among the leaders of the revolt against Philip. He planned on fleeing to the Netherlands and declaring himself king, with the support of the rebels. In one of his chaotic actions he confessed the plot to Ruy Gómez de Silva, Prince of Eboli, who loyally informed the king.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: In 1566, Floris of Montmorency established new contacts with him in the name of Count Egmont and Philip of Montmorency, to repeat the previous plot.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: In 1567, the prince gave new proofs of mental instability. During a walk, water thrown from a window accidentally splashed him. He ordered the house to be set on fire. He tried to stab and kill the Duke of Alba in public and in broad daylight. He tried to throw a servant who bothered him through the window of the highest floor of the palace, and also tried to kill a guard who had also displeased him that same year.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: In the autumn of 1567, he made another attempt to flee to the Netherlands by asking John of Austria to take him to Italy. John was loyal to the king and aware of Carlos's mental state. He asked for 24 hours to think about it and used them to reveal the plan to the king who immediately denied permission for the trip.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: As a consequence, Carlos tried to murder John. He loaded his gun and called John of Austria to his room, where he tried to shoot him repeatedly. The attempted assassination was fruitless because one of the servants, knowing the prince full well, had discharged the gun while the prince called John. Carlos grew so irate that he tried to attack John with his bare hands. He eventually informed various people in court of his desire to murder the King. There is debate about whether he actually tried to do so. After that incident, Philip imprisoned the prince in his rooms without receiving correspondence and with limited contacts with the exterior world.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Just before midnight on 17 January 1568, Philip II, in armour, and with four councillors, entered Don Carlos' bedchamber in the Alcázar of Madrid where they declared his arrest, seized his papers and weapons, and nailed up the windows. Since Carlos threatened to take his own life, the king banned him from having knives or forks in his room. Carlos then tried to starve himself, but this also failed.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: When it came to explaining the situation to public opinion and European courts, Philip tried to explain his son's absence without disclosing his actual faults or mental condition, in hopes of an eventual recovery. This lack of transparency was used to fuel the anti-Imperial propaganda of William the Silent. On 24 July 1568, the prince died in his room, probably as the result of his delicate health. His death was used as one of the core elements of the Spanish Black Legend in the Netherlands, which needed to justify a revolt against the king. It was later claimed that he was poisoned on the orders of King Philip, especially by William in his "Apology", a 1581 propaganda work against the Spanish king. The idea of the poisoning had been held by central and north European historians, based on the pieces of propaganda produced in the Netherlands, until the 20th century, while most Spanish and Italian historians kept claiming that evidence and documentation pointed at a death by natural causes. Modern historians now think that Don Carlos died of natural causes. Carlos grew very thin, and some had interpreted his hunger strikes as an eating disorder developed during his imprisonment, alternating self-starvation with heavy binges.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The idea of King Philip confining and murdering his own son later played a minor role in establishing the anti-Spanish Black Legend in England, and a major one in forming it in the Netherlands, Germany and central Europe. The propaganda created from it formed the basis for Friedrich Schiller's 1787 tragedy "Don Karlos, Infant von Spanien".


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Schiller based his work on a novel written in 1672 by the French Abbé, César Vichard de Saint-Réal, which was also the source used by the English writer Thomas Otway for his play "Don Carlos, Prince of Spain". In both works, romantic tragedies that combine nationalism and romantic love, Carlos incarnates the ideal of the romantic knight, noble and brave. He is presented as the lover of young Elizabeth of Valois, Philip's wife, as they both fight for freedom and for their love against a cruel, despotic, merciless, and far-too-old-for-Isabel Philip II and his court of equally cruel and despotic Spaniards. Finally, the hero is defeated by treason due to his excess of nobility.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Schiller's play was adapted into several operas, most notably Giuseppe Verdi's "Don Carlos" (1867, also known under its Italian title, "Don Carlo"). Verdi's opera is probably the version of the story most familiar to modern audiences, as it is a mainstay of the operatic repertoire and is still frequently performed. In it, Carlos is portrayed sympathetically as a victim of court intrigues, and little reference is made to his mental instability or violent tendencies.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The story of a king jailing his own son is also the basis for the Spanish play "La vida es sueño" ("Life Is a Dream") (1635), by Pedro Calderón de la Barca; however, this play does not explicitly refer to Don Carlos, starts with a different premise, and was likely inspired by a combination of religious reflection and Plato's cave, in the line of Spanish Neoplatonism.


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: The role of Carlos is portrayed by Canadian actor Mark Ghanimé in the CW show "Reign". He was portrayed as a sexual deviant, who enjoyed being whipped, and showed interest in ruling Scotland with a crown matrimonial. "Reign" does hold true to the facts of brain damage, but instead of a fall, Don Carlos's head is impaled by a piece of wood from his "sex horse".


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: Carlos is portrayed by Joseph Cuby as a 14 year old sadist betrothed to Princess Mariella (Francesca Annis) in the TV series "Sir Francis Drake" (1962) episode "Visit to Spain".


title: Carlos, Prince of Asturias

text: John Foxe, in "Actes and Monuments", better known as "Foxe's Book of Martyrs" (2nd ed., 1570), wrote about Don Carlos as follows:


title: Michael D. Cohen (actor)

text: Michael D. Cohen (born ) is a Canadian actor. He is best known for his role as Schwoz Schwartz in "Henry Danger" and its spinoffs, "The Adventures of Kid Danger" and "Danger Force".


title: Michael D. Cohen (actor)

text: Born in Winnipeg, Cohen started transitioning from female to male in his 20s, making the information publicly known only in 2019. He and his family moved to Richmond, British Columbia, when he was 10. As a fan of Carol Burnett and the other actors on "The Carol Burnett Show", he was inspired to be an actor and writer, and won a Young Playwright's Contest at age 12.


title: Michael D. Cohen (actor)

text: Years after graduating from college, Cohen moved to Toronto, where he studied acting and landed his first voice over job, without an agent, on the animated TV series "Pippi Longstocking". He began his career when he appeared in "Moville Mysteries," shortly after which he appeared in "Queer as Folk", "Doc", "RoboRoach", and "Henry's World," as well as many commercials. In 2005, he won the national Moc Docs award for Best Mockumentary for his short film "Jew Jube Lives"—a rap parody based on the question, "If Eminem were Jewish and grew up in Thornhill, what would he be like?" He was the voice of Ty Archer in the animated TV series "Grossology" for which he and the ensemble received a Gemini Award nomination, the Canadian equivalent of an Emmy.


title: Michael D. Cohen (actor)

text: Since 2014, Cohen has played Schwoz Schwartz on the sitcom "Henry Danger", a role he continues in the "Henry Danger" spinoff series "Danger Force". He has appeared on shows such as "Modern Family", "The Real O'Neals", "2 Broke Girls", "The Mindy Project", "Backstrom", "Eagleheart" and "Austin & Ally". His recent film credits include the comedy "Suburbicon", directed by George Clooney and written by the Coen brothers; the Oscar-nominated film "Whiplash;" and the Canadian Screen Award-nominated film "It Was You Charlie", for which he was nominated for an ACTRA Award for Outstanding Lead Performance.


title: Michael D. Cohen (actor)

text: Cohen has dozens of commercial credits including Mini Starburst, FedEx, Capital One, Boston Market, Honda (with Patrick Warburton), and the Super Bowl Hulu Plus campaign with Will Arnett. Cohen was co-chair of the SAG-AFTRA Hollywood Conservatory at the American Film Institute l, and is a member of the National SAG-AFTRA Conservatory Committee. He has a master's degree in adult education focusing on transformative education for performers. He offers acting workshops and private audition coaching for actors in L.A., Toronto and around the world. He resides in Los Angeles.


title: Urban renewal

text: Urban renewal (also called urban regeneration in the United Kingdom and urban redevelopment in the United States) is a program of land redevelopment often used to address urban decay in cities. Urban renewal involves the clearing out of blighted areas in inner cities to clear out slums and create opportunities for higher class housing, businesses, and other developments.


title: Urban renewal

text: A primary purpose of urban renewal is to restore economic viability to a given area by attracting external private and public investment and by encouraging business start-ups and survival. It is controversial for its eventual displacement and destabilization of low-income residents, including African Americans and other marginalized groups.


title: Urban renewal

text: Modern attempts at renewal began in the late 19th century in developed nations, and experienced an intense phase in the late 1940s under the rubric of reconstruction. The process has had a major impact on many urban landscapes and has played an important role in the history and demographics of cities around the world.


title: Urban renewal

text: Urban renewal is a process where privately owned properties within a designated renewal area are purchased or taken by eminent domain by a municipal redevelopment authority, razed and then reconveyed to selected developers who devote them to other uses.


title: Urban renewal

text: The concept of urban renewal as a method for social reform emerged in England as a reaction to the increasingly cramped and unsanitary conditions of the urban poor in the rapidly industrializing cities of the 19th century. The agenda that emerged was a progressive doctrine that assumed better housing conditions would reform its residents morally and economically. Another style of reform – imposed by the state for reasons of aesthetics and efficiency – could be said to have begun in 1853, with the recruitment of Baron Haussmann by Napoleon III for the redevelopment of Paris.


title: Urban renewal

text: In the 20th and 21st centuries, the practice of urban regeneration is normally completed with one (or more) of three goals, economic renewal, social/cultural renewal, or environmental renewal. Many cities link the revitalization of the central business district and gentrification of residential neighborhoods to earlier urban renewal programs. The goal of urban renewal evolved into a policy based less on destruction and more on renovation and investment, and today is an integral part of many local governments, often combined with small and big business incentives. The aims of which is:


title: Urban renewal

text: The process of urban regeneration is often carried out in rural areas, referred to as village renewal, though it may not be exactly the same in practice.


title: Urban renewal

text: In some cases, urban renewal may result in urban sprawl when city infrastructure begins to include freeways and expressways.


title: Urban renewal

text: Urban renewal is a widely discussed and controversial program. It has been seen by proponents as an economic engine and a reform mechanism, and by critics as a mechanism for control. The controversy often involves the use of eminent domain, demolition of historic structures and direct displacement brought by slum clearance. In terms of utilizing the eminent domain as a legal method to take private property for city-initiated development, Kelo case is the real-life example to demonstrate the resistance against eminent use. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the taking by a 5 to 4 vote, but nothing was built on the taken property. Though it may bring more wealth to communities, it may also edge out its preexisting residents.


title: Urban renewal

text: In Buenos Aires, Argentina, Puerto Madero is a known example of an urban renewal project. In the 1990s, the Argentine government decided to build a new residential and commercial district to replace city's old port and docks. More than 50 skyscrapers have been built in the last 20 years. Puerto Madero is now Buenos Aires' most expensive and exclusive neighborhood.


title: Urban renewal

text: In Rio de Janeiro, the is a large-scale urban waterfront revitalization project, which covers a centrally located five million square meter area. The project aims to redevelop the port area, increasing the city center attractiveness as a whole and enhancing the city's competitiveness in the global economy. The urban renovation involves 700 km of public networks for water supply, sanitation, drainage, electricity, gas and telecom; 5 km of tunnels; 70 km of roads; 650 km of sidewalks; 17 km of bike path; 15.000 trees; and 3 plants for sanitation treatment.


title: Urban renewal

text: Tackling land shortage in Hong Kong has always been a top priority on the government's agenda, with numerous strategies deployed to increase land supply. One of the current initiatives, noted in the Chief Executive's 2022 Policy Address, is to consolidate property interests and expedite urban renewal.


title: Urban renewal

text: In Italy, the concept of urban renewal had been having the classical meaning of "recovery", "re-use", and also "redevelopment" for many years. It has not been long time that this meaning has changed, or has begun to change, towards the Anglo-Saxon model taking in account the idea of an action that "determines an increase of economic, cultural, social values in an existing urban or territorial context."


title: Urban renewal

text: For instance, we can mention the regional law of 29 July 2008, nr. 21, of the Puglia Region, "Norms for urban regeneration", which states: «By this law, the Puglia Region promotes the regeneration of parts of cities and urban systems in coherence with municipal and inter-municipal strategies in order to improve urban, socio-economics, environmental and cultural conditions of human settlements "LEGGE REGIONALE 29 luglio 2008, n. 21: "Norme per la rigenerazione urbana".


title: Urban renewal

text: A similar concept was carried out by Lombardy Region by mean of its Regional Law of 26 November 2019 - n. 18 "Simplification and incentive measures for urban and territorial regeneration, as well as for the recovery of existing building heritage. Changes and addendums to the regional law 11 March 2005, n. 12 (Law for the Government of the Territory) and other regional laws "Legge Regione Lombardia 18/2019.


title: Urban renewal

text: This law defines the urban regeneration as "the coordinated set of urban-building interventions and social initiatives that can include replacement, re-use, redevelopment of the built environment and reorganization of the urban landscape by mean of recovery of degraded, underused or abandoned areas, as well as through the creation and management of infrastructure, green spaces and services […] with a horizon towards sustainability and environmental and social resilience, technological innovation and increasing biodiversity" (Art 2. L.R.18/2019).


title: Urban renewal

text: The same law introduces some rewards reserved to whom builds for social purposes. Moreover, these rewards are also reserved for those who carry on some particular implementation models. For instance, you can increase the volume of your building whenever "integrated safety systems and construction site risk management processes are applied; methods that are based on traceability and control activities, with particular reference to soil movement and waste traceability, based on advanced technologies", the increase in the building index is recognized in the art. 3 and these rewards are also given when technologies as geolocation, video surveillance and perimeter protection are implemented in order to prevent the "risk of crime during all phases of construction sites" La legalità per la rigenerazione urbana: a law analysis.


title: Urban renewal

text: In the French colonial period, the entire city of Marrakesh - the city inside the defensive walls - was razed and redeveloped, except for the preservation of mosques, madrassas, and funerary memorials. The preserved madrassas include buildings erected as caravanserai.


title: Urban renewal

text: The history of Singapore's urban renewal goes back to the time period surrounding the Second World War. Before the war, Singapore's housing environment had already been a problem. The tension of both infrastructure and housing conditions were worsened by the rapidly increasing number of the Singapore population in the 1930s. As a consequence of the war and the lack of economic development, between the 1940s to the 1950s, the previous evil of housing conditions continued to happen. As much as 240,000 squatters were placed in Singapore during the 1950s. It was caused by the movement of migrants, especially from peninsular Malaysia and the baby boom. In mid 1959, overcrowded slums were inhabited by a big number of squatter populations, whereas these areas lacked the existence of service facilities such as sanitation.


title: Urban renewal

text: Since the establishment of the Republic of Singapore, urban renewal has been included in the part of the national improvement policy that was urgently put in action. Before that, the 1958 master plan had already been designed to solve the city problems. However, due to the lack of urban planning experts caused by the deficiency of professional staff, criticism came from many urban practitioners. The professional team recommended by the United Nations then was asked by the government to cope with the urban renewal matters and its redevelopment plan in 1961. Based on the UN assistance report, two pilot developments were initiated in the end of 1964 by the government. These redevelopments then led to the success of Singapore's urban renewal because the government could provide sufficient amount of public housing and business areas.


title: Urban renewal

text: In the establishment of urban renewal programmes, some difficulties were experienced by the PAP government. The obstacles came from the resistance of people who used to live in the slums and squatters. It was reported by Singapore newspapers that those people were reluctant to be replaced. This became the major problems of 1960s redevelopment schemes. Affordable land value also became one of its reasons. Another problem was that the government had to purchase the private land owned by the middle and upper society to make the land vacant and be used for redevelopment.


title: Urban renewal

text: China experienced the fastest urbanization and has one of the greatest urban sprawl scale in the world from 1990. Massive real estate development and reconstruction brought economic revitalization. However, when cleaning the urban decay area, traditional and historic buildings were destroyed to different levels. In the industry, researchers and practitioners used “old town reconstruction” and “urban regeneration” to describe the changes made to the urban decay area. After having more research about urban renewal in terms of international trends and domestic development, the practitioners in the industry built consensus to use “urban renewal” to describe all the changes made to the old town area. With the rapid development pace of urbanization in China, the urbanization rate reached the inflection point of the Northam curve. The city development was not about urban sprawl and real estate development on a large scale. China improved its urban development strategy by using inventory planning other than incremental planning. Chinese promoted urbanization aggressively as national policy. But due to the change from the concept of urban renewal in terms of its presentation from the physical dimension, China now promotes small-scale “repairs” to improve the urban environment in a more sustainable and reasonable way. At the 15th China Central City Work Conference, the policy, "urban repair and ecological restoration," was put forward.  Immediately thereafter, new urban renewal models such as Guangzhou's micro-renovation and Shanghai's micro-renewal appeared to lead the trend of a new era of urban renewal programs in China.


title: Urban renewal

text: “Planning is inherently political”, however,  the urban development in China for the past decade is strikingly similar to the situation in many Western countries. In terms of the similarity sharing with U.S. urban renewal programs, both countries viewed older neighborhoods as outdated and blighted, encouraged local governments to cooperate with local development interests for downtown redevelopment, failed to provide enough support and concern for residents of cleared areas, who often were the low-income residents, and building plenty of highways to reach large scale urban sprawl.


title: Urban renewal

text: In Taipei, Taiwan, Xinyi Special District is a known example of an urban renewal project. Its historical development began in 1976, when the Taipei Municipal Government accepted the proposal to redevelop the area east of the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall. The goal of this redevelopment was to set up a secondary commercial center away from the more crowded old city center (Taipei Station, Ximending area). The redevelopment hoped to increase the prosperity of the eastern district and the convenience of urban life for existing residents. The center's purpose was to expand business investment in the area and attract international financial services and technology firms. It also planned for residential development by building a completely new community. The Xinyi Project Area is the only commercial development area in Taipei with a wholly planned street and urban design. In addition to attracting corporations, it also features large retail spaces, department stores, and shopping malls. Xinyi Special District is now the prime central business district of Taipei.


title: Urban renewal

text: From the 1850s onwards, the terrible conditions of the urban poor in the slums of London began to attract the attention of social reformers and philanthropists, who began a movement for social housing. The first area to be targeted was the notorious slum called the Devil's Acre near Westminster. This new movement was largely funded by George Peabody and the Peabody Trust and had a lasting impact on the urban character of Westminster.


title: Urban renewal

text: Slum clearance began with the Rochester Buildings, on the corner of Old Pye Street and Perkin's Rent, which were built in 1862 by the merchant William Gibbs. They are one of the earliest large-scale philanthropic housing developments in London. The Rochester Buildings were sold to the Peabody Trust in 1877 and later become known as Blocks A to D of the Old Perkin's Rents Estate. Angela Burdett-Coutts, 1st Baroness Burdett-Coutts funded an experimental social housing estate, among the first of its kind, on the corner of Columbia Road and Old Pye Street (now demolished). In 1869, the Peabody Trust built one of its first housing estates at Brewer's Green, between Victoria Street and St. James's Park. What remained of the Devil's Acre on the other side of Victoria Street was cleared and further Peabody estates were built after the Cross Act of 1875.


title: Urban renewal

text: In 1882, the Peabody Trust built the Abbey Orchard Estate on former marshland at the corner of Old Pye Street and Abbey Orchard Street. Like many of the social housing estates, the Abbey Orchard Estate was built following the square plan concept. Blocks of flats were built around a courtyard, creating a semi-private space within the estate functioning as recreation area. The courtyards were meant to create a community atmosphere and the blocks of flats were designed to allow sunlight into the courtyards. The blocks of flats were built using high-quality brickwork and included architectural features such as lettering, glazing, fixtures and fittings. The estates built in the area at the time were considered model dwellings and included shared laundry and sanitary facilities, innovative at the time, and fireplaces in some bedrooms. The design was subsequently repeated in numerous other housing estates in London.


title: Urban renewal

text: State intervention was first achieved with the passage of the Public Health Act of 1875 through Parliament. The Act focused on combating filthy urban living conditions that were the cause of disease outbreaks. It required all new residential construction to include running water and an internal drainage system and also prohibited the construction of shoddy housing by building contractors.


title: Urban renewal

text: The London County Council was created in 1889 as the municipal authority in the County of London and in 1890 the Old Nichol in the East End of London was declared a slum and the Council authorized its clearance and the rebuilding of an area of some , including the Nichol and Snow estates, and a small piece on the Shoreditch side of Boundary Street, formally Cock Lane. The slum clearance began in 1891 and included 730 houses inhabited by 5,719 people. The LCC architects designed 21 and Rowland Plumbe two of 23 blocks containing between 10 and 85 tenements each. A total of 1,069 tenements, mostly two or three-roomed, were planned to accommodate 5,524 persons. The project was hailed as setting "new aesthetic standards for housing the working classes" and included a new laundry, 188 shops, and 77 workshops. Churches and schools were preserved. Building for the project began in 1893 and it was opened by the Prince of Wales in 1900. Other such schemes in the 1880s, where newly cleared sites were sold on to developers, included Whitechapel, Wild Street, Whitecross Street and Clerkenwell.


title: Urban renewal

text: Currently there are two main Urban Regeneration projects going on in London, Elephant Park at Elephant and Castle and at Stratford. These are both being done by Lendlease, a multinational company focusing on redeveloping neglected city areas.


title: Urban renewal

text: The 1917 Tudor Walters Committee Report into the provision of housing and post-war reconstruction in the United Kingdom, was commissioned by Parliament as a response to the shocking lack of fitness amongst many recruits during the War; this was attributed to poor living conditions, a belief summed up in a housing poster of the period "you cannot expect to get an A1 population out of C3 homes".


title: Urban renewal

text: The report's recommendations, coupled with a chronic housing shortage after the First World War led to a government-led program of house building with the slogan 'Homes for Heroes'. Christopher Addison, the Minister for Housing at the time was responsible for the drafting of the Housing, Town Planning, &c. Act 1919 which introduced the new concept of the state being involved in the building of new houses. This marked the start of a long 20th century tradition of state-owned housing, which would much later evolve into council estates.


title: Urban renewal

text: With the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, increased house building and government expenditure was used to pull the country out of recession. The Housing Act of 1930 gave local councils wide-ranging powers to demolish properties unfit for human habitation or that posed a danger to health, and obligated them to rehouse those people who were relocated due to the large scale slum clearance programs. Cities with a large proportion of Victorian terraced housing – housing that was no longer deemed of sufficient standard for modern living requirements – underwent the greatest changes. Over 5,000 homes (25,000 residents) in the city of Bristol were designated as redevelopment areas in 1933 and slated for demolition. Although efforts were made to house the victims of the demolitions in the same area as before, in practice this was too difficult to fully implement and many people were rehoused in other areas, even different cities. In an effort to rehouse the poorest people affected by redevelopment, the rent for housing was set at an artificially low level, although this policy also only achieved mixed success.


title: Urban renewal

text: The Josefov neighborhood, or Old Jewish Quarter, in Prague was leveled and rebuilt in an effort at urban renewal between 1890 and 1913.


title: Urban renewal

text: Other programs, such as that in Castleford in the United Kingdom and known as The Castleford Project seek to establish a process of urban renewal which enables local citizens to have greater control and ownership of the direction of their community and the way in which it overcomes market failure. This supports important themes in urban renewal today, such as participation, sustainability and trust – and government acting as advocate and 'enabler', rather than an instrument of command and control.


title: Urban renewal

text: During the 1990s the concept of culture-led regeneration gained ground. Examples most often cited as successes include Temple Bar in Dublin where tourism was attracted to a bohemian 'cultural quarter', Barcelona where the 1992 Olympics provided a catalyst for infrastructure improvements and the redevelopment of the water front area, and Bilbao where the building of a new art museum was the focus for a new business district around the city's derelict dock area. The approach has become very popular in the UK due to the availability of lottery funding for capital projects and the vibrancy of the cultural and creative sectors. However, the arrival of Tate Modern in the London borough of Southwark may be heralded as a catalyst to economic revival in its surrounding neighborhood.


title: Urban renewal

text: In post-apartheid South Africa major grassroots social movements such as the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign and Abahlali baseMjondolo emerged to contest 'urban renewal' programs that forcibly relocated the poor out of the cities.


title: Urban renewal

text: The politics of urban renewal which frequently relies on the state's dominance in the discourse of removing the character and infrastructure of older city cores, with that which is required by existing market based constituents has to be examined further. Professor Kenneth Paul Tan of the National University of Singapore has this to say "Singapore's self-image of having achieved success against all odds puts tremendous pressure on its government and people to maintain and exceed this success. The push for progress and development destroys many things in its path, often indiscriminately, sometimes unwittingly. To cope psychically with such losses, Singapore's culture of comfort and affluence has been attained through the self-mastery of repressive techniques. Desiring economic progress, upward mobility, affluent and convenient lifestyles and a ‘world-class’ city."


title: Urban renewal

text: "Singaporeans have had to repress the loss of their sense of place and community, family ties, passion and compassion, Asian customs and values, openness to the rest of the world and even the discipline, hard work and thrift associated with earlier capitalist–industrial attitudes. But no repressive efforts can be complete, consistent and fully successful, even in dominant hegemony. Therefore, the ‘now’ is always a complex and fractured world of disjunctive values, attitudes and ideals. The supernatural intrusions featured in these five films should tell us something about the impossibility of a coherent world of ideology and experience."


title: Urban renewal

text: Urban renewal projects in the United States have included the design and construction of Central Park in New York and the 1909 Plan for Chicago by Daniel Burnham. Similarly, the efforts of Jacob Riis in advocating for the demolition of degraded areas of New York in the late 19th century were also formative. The redevelopment of large sections of New York City and New York State by Robert Moses between the 1930s and the 1970s was a notable and prominent example of urban redevelopment. Moses directed the construction of new bridges, highways, housing projects, and public parks.


title: Urban renewal

text: Other cities across the USA began to create redevelopment programs in the late 1930s and 1940s. These early projects were generally focused on slum clearance and were implemented by local public housing authorities, which were responsible both for clearing slums and for building new affordable housing. The City Planning and Housing Council (CHPC) founded in 1937 had a large hand in the reconstruction of urban slums, with their primary mission being the elimination of poor housing conditions, creating less crowded and cleaner public housing.


title: Urban renewal

text: In 1944, the GI Bill (officially the Serviceman's Readjustment Act) guaranteed Veterans Administration (VA) mortgages to veterans under favorable terms, which fueled suburbanization after the end of World War II, as places like Levittown, New York, Warren, Michigan and the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles were transformed from farmland into cities occupied by tens of thousands of families in a few years. However, the GI Bill was primarily beneficial for white veterans over black ones, so in inner cities where black veterans tried using the benefits from the GI bill to occur housing and/or jobs, it was much more difficult.


title: Urban renewal

text: The Housing Act of 1949, also known as the Taft-Ellender-Wagner Act, provided federal loans to cities to acquire and clear slum areas to be sold to private developers to redevelop in accordance with a plan prepared by the city (normally with new housing), and grants to cover two-thirds of the portion of the city's costs in excess of the sale prices received from the developers, as well as provide millions of dollars to create public housing throughout the country. The phrase used at the time was "urban redevelopment". "Urban renewal" was a phrase popularized with the passage of the Housing Act of 1954, which made these projects more enticing to developers by, among other things, providing mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA).


title: Urban renewal

text: The term "urban renewal" was not introduced in the USA until the Housing Act was again amended in 1954. That was also the year in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the general validity of urban redevelopment statutes in the landmark case, "Berman v. Parker".


title: Urban renewal

text: Under the powerful influence of multimillionaire R.K. Mellon, Pittsburgh became the first major city to undertake a modern urban-renewal program in May 1950. Pittsburgh was infamous around the world as one of the dirtiest and most economically depressed cities, and seemed ripe for urban renewal. A large section of downtown at the heart of the city was demolished, converted to parks, office buildings, and a sports arena and renamed the Golden Triangle in what was universally recognized as a major success. Other neighborhoods were also subjected to urban renewal, but with mixed results. Some areas did improve, while other areas, such as East Liberty and the Hill District, declined following ambitious projects that shifted traffic patterns, blocked streets to vehicular traffic, isolated or divided neighborhoods with highways, and removed large numbers of ethnic and minority residents. An entire neighborhood was destroyed (to be replaced by the Civic Arena), displacing 8000 residents (most of whom were poor and black).


title: Urban renewal

text: Because of the ways in which it targeted the most disadvantaged sector of the American population, novelist James Baldwin famously dubbed Urban Renewal "Negro Removal" in the 1960s.


title: Urban renewal

text: Early to mid-20th century Detroit was a prime area for urban "redevelopers", as much of the city had only decrepit housing available. The efforts of the CHPC and the FHA to renew Detroit caused huge amounts of black displacement due to the construction of highways and airports directly through black neighborhoods like 8-mile and Paradise Valley. Black families were thrown out from their homes and not provided relocation services. The "slums" being cleared or being looked at for redevelopment were primarily black neighborhoods.


title: Urban renewal

text: In 1956, the Federal-Aid Highway Act gave state and federal government complete control over new highways, and often they were routed directly through vibrant urban neighborhoods—isolating or destroying many—since the focus of the program was to bring traffic in and out of the central cores of cities as expeditiously as possible and nine out of every ten dollars spent came from the federal government. This resulted in a serious degradation of the tax bases of many cities, isolated entire neighborhoods, and meant that existing commercial districts were bypassed by the majority of commuters. Segregation continued to increase as communities were displaced. Black families that had their homes and neighborhoods destroyed had to find housing options deeper in the inner city as whites could then use those highways to spread further and further into the suburbs but continue to work in the city.


title: Urban renewal

text: In Boston, one of the country's oldest cities, almost a third of the old city was demolished—including the historic West End—to make way for a new highway, low- and moderate-income high-rises (which eventually became luxury housing), and new government and commercial buildings. This came to be seen as a tragedy by many residents and urban planners, and one of the centerpieces of the redevelopment—Government Center—is still considered an example of the excesses of urban renewal.


title: Urban renewal

text: In 1961, Jane Jacobs published "The Death and Life of Great American Cities", one of the first—and strongest—critiques of contemporary large-scale urban renewal. However, it would still be a few years before organized movements began to oppose urban renewal. The Rondout neighborhood in Kingston, New York (on the Hudson River) was essentially destroyed by a federally funded urban renewal program in the 1960s, with more than 400 old buildings demolished, most of them historic brick structures built in the 19th century. Similarly ill-conceived urban renewal programs gutted the historic centers of other towns and cities across America in the 1950s and 1960s (for example the West End neighborhood in Boston, the Gateway District of Minneapolis, the downtown area of Norfolk, Virginia and the historic waterfront areas of the towns of Narragansett and Newport in Rhode Island).