Buckingham Palace is the London residence and administrative headquarters of the monarchy of the United Kingdom. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is at the centre of state occasions and royal hospitality, it has been a focal point for the British people at times of national mourning. Known as Buckingham House, the building at the core of today's palace was a large townhouse built for the Duke of Buckingham in 1703 on a site, in private ownership for at least 150 years, it was acquired by King George III in 1761 as a private residence for Queen Charlotte and became known as The Queen's House. During the 19th century it was enlarged, principally by architects John Nash and Edward Blore, who constructed three wings around a central courtyard. Buckingham Palace became the London residence of the British monarch on the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837; the last major structural additions were made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including the East Front, which contains the well-known balcony on which the royal family traditionally congregates to greet crowds.

A German bomb destroyed the palace chapel during World War II. The original early 19th-century interior designs, many of which survive, include widespread use of brightly coloured scagliola and blue and pink lapis, on the advice of Sir Charles Long. King Edward VII oversaw a partial redecoration in a Belle Époque gold colour scheme. Many smaller reception rooms are furnished in the Chinese regency style with furniture and fittings brought from the Royal Pavilion at Brighton and from Carlton House; the palace has 775 rooms, the garden is the largest private garden in London. The state rooms, used for official and state entertaining, are open to the public each year for most of August and September and on some days in winter and spring. In the Middle Ages, the site of the future palace formed part of the Manor of Ebury; the marshy ground was watered by the river Tyburn, which still flows below the courtyard and south wing of the palace. Where the river was fordable, the village of Eye Cross grew.

Ownership of the site changed hands many times. William gave the site to Geoffrey de Mandeville, who bequeathed it to the monks of Westminster Abbey. In 1531, Henry VIII acquired the Hospital of St James, which became St James's Palace, from Eton College, in 1536 he took the Manor of Ebury from Westminster Abbey; these transfers brought the site of Buckingham Palace back into royal hands for the first time since William the Conqueror had given it away 500 years earlier. Various owners leased it from royal landlords, the freehold was the subject of frenzied speculation during the 17th century. By the old village of Eye Cross had long since fallen into decay, the area was wasteland. Needing money, James I sold off part of the Crown freehold but retained part of the site on which he established a 4-acre mulberry garden for the production of silk. Clement Walker in Anarchia Anglicana refers to "new-erected sodoms and spintries at the Mulberry Garden at S. James's". In the late 17th century, the freehold was inherited from the property tycoon Sir Hugh Audley by the great heiress Mary Davies.

The first house erected within the site was that of a Sir William Blake, around 1624. The next owner was Lord Goring, who from 1633 extended Blake's house and developed much of today's garden known as Goring Great Garden, he did not, obtain the freehold interest in the mulberry garden. Unbeknown to Goring, in 1640 the document "failed to pass the Great Seal before King Charles I fled London, which it needed to do for legal execution", it was this critical omission that helped the British royal family regain the freehold under King George III. The improvident Goring defaulted on his rents. Arlington House rose on the site—the location of the southern wing of today's palace—the next year. In 1698, John Sheffield the first Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, acquired the lease; the house which forms the architectural core of the palace was built for the first Duke of Buckingham and Normanby in 1703 to the design of William Winde. The style chosen was of a large, three-floored central block with two smaller flanking service wings.

Buckingham House was sold by Buckingham's illegitimate son, Sir Charles Sheffield, in 1761 to George III for £21,000. Sheffield's leasehold on the mulberry garden site, the freehold of, still owned by the royal family, was due to expire in 1774. Under the new Crown ownership, the building was intended as a private retreat for King George III's wife, Queen Charlotte, was accordingly known as The Queen's House. Remodelling of the structure began in 1762. In 1775, an Act of Parliament settled the property on Queen Charlotte, in exchange for her rights to Somerset House, 14 of her 15 children were born there; some furnishings were transferred from Carlton House, others had been bought in France after the French Revolution of 1789. While St James's Palace remained the official and ceremonial royal residence, the name "Buckingham-palace" was used from at least 1791. After his accession to the throne in 1820, King George IV continued the renovation with the idea in mind of a small, comfortab

Blenika Peak is the sharp rocky peak rising to 2,560 m just east of the main crest of northern Sentinel Range in Ellsworth Mountains, Antarctica. It surmounts Zhenda Glacier to Skaklya Glacier to the north; the peak is named after the settlement of Blenika in Southern Bulgaria. Blenika Peak is located at 77°52′01″S 86°03′02″W, 3.53 km northeast of Mount Barden, 4.14 km south-southeast of Mount Reimer, 10.02 km southwest of Mount Lanning in Sostra Heights. US mapping in 1961. Mountains in Antarctica Newcomer Glacier. Scale 1:250 000 topographic map. Reston, Virginia: US Geological Survey, 1961. Antarctic Digital Database. Scale 1:250000 topographic map of Antarctica. Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research. Since 1993 updated. Blenika Peak. SCAR Composite Gazetteer of Antarctica. Bulgarian Antarctic Gazetteer. Antarctic Place-names Commission. Blenika Peak. Copernix satellite imageThis article includes information from the Antarctic Place-names Commission of Bulgaria, used with permission

Joseph H. Walker was a U. S. lawyer and politician who served as the Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1909 to 1911. Walker was born on July 13, 1886 in Worcester, Massachusetts to Joseph H. Walker and Hannah M. Walker, his father was a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1893 to 1899. Walker earned degrees from Phillips Exeter Academy, Brown University, Harvard College, Harvard Law School, he was admitted to the Suffolk County bar in 1889. Walker was a member of the Brookline School Committee from 1897 to 1903, he served on the Town Committee and was a Republican State Committeeman. In 1904 Walker was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, he served as chairman of the House Rules and Means Committee, the special State Accounts Committee, the Railroads Committee. In 1909 he was elected Speaker of the House. Walker was a candidate for Governor of Massachusetts in 1911, but lost the Republican nomination to Lieutenant Governor Louis A. Frothingham.

He lost in the general election to Governor Eugene Foss. He ran a third time in 1914 as a member of the Progressive Party, he finished in third place with 7.02% of the vote. Walker died on November 26, 1941 at the Phillips House of the Massachusetts General Hospital