Fiddler on the Roof is a musical with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, book by Joseph Stein, set in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia in or around 1905. It is based on his Daughters and other tales by Sholem Aleichem; the story centers on Tevye, the father of five daughters, his attempts to maintain his Jewish religious and cultural traditions as outside influences encroach upon the family's lives. He must cope both with the strong-willed actions of his three older daughters, who wish to marry for love – each one's choice of a husband moves further away from the customs of their Jewish faith and heritage – and with the edict of the Tsar that evicts the Jews from their village; the original Broadway production of the show, which opened in 1964, had the first musical theatre run in history to surpass 3,000 performances. Fiddler held the record for the longest-running Broadway musical for 10 years until Grease surpassed its run; the production was extraordinarily profitable and acclaimed.

It won nine Tony Awards, including best musical, book and choreography. It spawned five Broadway revivals and a successful 1971 film adaptation and has enjoyed enduring international popularity, it has been a popular choice for school and community productions. Fiddler on the Roof is based on Tevye and his Daughters, a series of stories by Sholem Aleichem that he wrote in Yiddish between 1894 and 1914 about Jewish life in a village in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia at the turn of the 20th century, it is influenced by Life Is with People, by Mark Zborowski and Elizabeth Herzog. Aleichem wrote a dramatic adaptation of the stories that he left unfinished at his death, but, produced in Yiddish in 1919 by the Yiddish Art Theater and made into a film in the 1930s. In the late 1950s, a musical based on the stories, called Tevye and his Daughters, was produced Off-Broadway by Arnold Perl. Rodgers and Hammerstein and Mike Todd considered bringing this musical to Broadway but dropped the idea.

Investors and some in the media worried that Fiddler on the Roof might be considered "too Jewish" to attract mainstream audiences. Other critics considered that it was "middlebrow" and superficial. For example, it portrays the local Russian officer as sympathetic, instead of brutal and cruel, as Sholom Aleichem had described him. Aleichem's stories ended with Tevye alone, his wife dead and his daughters scattered; the show found the right balance for its time if not authentic, to become "one of the first popular post-Holocaust depictions of the vanished world of Eastern European Jewry". Harold Prince replaced the original producer Fred Coe and brought in director/choreographer Jerome Robbins; the writers and Robbins considered naming the musical Tevye, before landing on a title suggested by various paintings by Marc Chagall that inspired the original set design. Contrary to popular belief, the "title of the musical does not refer to any specific painting". During rehearsals, one of the stars, Jewish actor Zero Mostel, feuded with Robbins, whom he held in contempt because Robbins had testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee and hid his Jewish heritage from the public.

Other cast members had run-ins with Robbins, who "abused the cast, drove the designers crazy strained the good nature of Hal Prince". Tevye, a poor Jewish milkman with five daughters, explains the customs of the Jews in the Russian shtetl of Anatevka in 1905, where their lives are as precarious as the perch of a fiddler on a roof. At Tevye's home, everyone is busy preparing for the Sabbath meal, his sharp-tongued wife, orders their daughters, Hodel, Chava and Bielke, about their tasks. Yente, the village matchmaker, arrives to tell Golde that Lazar Wolf, the wealthy butcher, a widower older than Tevye, wants to wed Tzeitel, the eldest daughter; the next two daughters and Chava, are excited about Yente's visit, but Tzeitel illustrates how it could have bad results. A girl from a poor family must take whatever husband Yente brings, but Tzeitel wants to marry her childhood friend, Motel the tailor. Tevye is delivering milk, he asks God: Whom would it hurt "If I Were a Rich Man"? The bookseller tells Tevye news from the outside world of expulsions.

A stranger, hears their conversation and scolds them for doing nothing more than talk. The men dismiss Perchik as a radical, but Tevye invites him home for the Sabbath meal and offers him food and a room in exchange for tutoring his two youngest daughters. Golde tells Tevye to meet Lazar after the Sabbath but does not tell him why, knowing that Tevye does not like Lazar. Tzeitel is afraid, but Motel resists: he is afraid of Tevye's temper, tradition says that a matchmaker arranges marriages. Motel is very poor and is saving up to buy a sewing machine before he approaches Tevye, to show that he can support a wife; the family gathers for the "Sabbath Prayer." After the Sabbath, Tevye meets Lazar for a drink at the village inn, assuming mistakenly that Lazar wants to buy his cow. Once the misunderstanding is cleared up, Tevye agrees to let Lazar marry Tzeitel – with a rich butcher, his daughter will never want for anything. All join in the celebration of Lazar's good fortune.

The Mannheim–Saarbrücken railway is a railway in the German states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and the Saarland that runs through Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Neustadt an der Weinstraße, Homburg and St. Ingbert, it is the most important railway line. It carries international traffic; the route was opened from 1847 to 1849 as the Pfälzische Ludwigsbahn between Ludwigshafen and Bexbach. The line is identical with the Ludwig Railway between Ludwigshafen and Homburg and it therefore referred to as the Pfälzische Ludwigsbahn; the remaining sections went into operation between 1867 and 1904. The line was electrified from 1960 to 1964. In its present form, the line has existed since 1969, when Deutsche Bundesbahn moved the Ludwigshafen Hauptbahnhof to its current location. Deutsche Bahn operates the route under timetable number 670; some sections of the line are cleared for speeds of 200 kilometres per hour for the ICE and TGV services between Paris, Kaiserslautern and Frankfurt. The Mannheim–Homburg section was integrated in the network of the Rhine-Neckar S-Bahn in two stages in 2003 and 2006.

The trunk line from Mannheim to Saarbrücken is a combination of different lines, due to the former Bavarian-Prussian national border and the interests of the towns along the Blies and the Würzbach in the shortest possible connection between Homburg and Saarbrücken. The Rhine, which formed the land border between Baden and Bavaria, had to be crossed between Ludwigshafen and Mannheim. For these reasons the line was completed in its present form only in 1904, with the exception of the relocation of the Ludwigshafen Hauptbahnhof in 1969; this is reflected in the chainage. The initial line was opened from 1847 to 1849 as the Palatine Ludwig Railway between Ludwigshafen and Bexbach. With the exception of the western Homburg–Bexbach section, it is now part of the Mannheim–Saarbrücken main line; the initial planning of a railway line in the north-south direction within the Palatinate, which had belonged to Bavaria since 1816, was set aside for an east-west line, promoted by Palatine entrepreneurs as facilitating the transport of Saar coal to the Rhine.

The planners revised their initial considerations of St. Ingbert as the western terminus, under pressure from Prussia, which wanted to have the long-term connection to Saarbrücken passing as far as possible over its own territory; that is why the planners considered Bexbach, with an extension via Neunkirchen and the Sulzbach valley. A suggestion that the railway line run via Zweibrücken and from there along the Schwarzbach via Rodalben and Langenkandel on the Rhine, did not proceed; the eastern terminus was disputed between Speyer, the capital of the Palatinate and the emerging port and trading centre of Rheinschanze. A memorandum supporting the interests of Speyer argued that it was an old trading town, whereas Rheinschanze was just a military base that would serve the transfer of goods; these endeavours were unsuccessful, as the part of the up-and-coming Rhine-Neckar Region to the east of the Rhine Mannheim, was the focus of attention and the export of coal to the area beyond the Rhine was considered more important.

Proposals for a line along the Dürkheim Valley failed, since its side valleys were too low and, above all, the Frankensteiner Steige would have had too steep. This route would have required stationary steam engines and rope haulage to overcome the differences in altitude. For this reason it was decided to proceed with a route along the valley through Neustadt. On 30 March 1838, some businessmen founded the "Bavarian railway company of the Palatine-Rheinschanze-Bexbach Railway" to develop the project. In May 1844, the company was renamed the Palatine Ludwig Railway Company. From March 1845, construction began under the leadership of Paul Denis. Coal from the Bexbach area would reach the industrial centres in the south of Germany and Switzerland via Rheinschanze; the line was named after the Bavarian King Ludwig I and the town of Ludwigshafen am Rhein, developing from Rheinschanze. The opening of the Ludwigshafenn–Neustadt section took place on 11 June 1847, the Homburg–Kaiserslautern section followed on 2 July 1848 and the Kaiserslautern–Frankenstein section was completed on 2 December of that year.

On 6 June of the following year, the Ludwig Railway reached Bexbach in the west. From August 1849, trains could run over the line from Ludwigshafen via Neustadt and Homburg to Bexbach; the main line was completed to Neunkirchen in 1850 and two years to Saarbrücken. Because of the rapid increase in traffic on both sides of the Rhine, there were calls for the construction of a line between Ludwigshafen and Mannheim in Baden from the end of the 1850s. In addition, there were plans for a Baden Odenwald Railway between Heidelberg and Würzburg, completed in 1866. In combination with this, a rail link across the Rhine would connect the Ludwig Railway with Bavarian Lower Franconia without crossing Württemberg. Added to this was the fact that the upgrading of the Mainz pontoon bridge and the extension of the Appenweier–Kehl railway to Strasbourg in 1861 threatened to reduce the competitiveness of the Ludwig Railway. In a treaty concluded at the beginning of 1862, the two countries agreed that Baden would take over the construction of the pylons and abutments.

Bavaria was given responsibility for the superstructure including flooring. In July of that year and Bavarian representatives reached an agreement on the location o

Grecian Shelter, was designated as Croquet Shelter on the original plans. It was referred to as the Prospect Park Peristyle; the building is situated near the southern edge of Prospect Park in Brooklyn, New York and is a peristyle with Corinthian columns. Constructed by McKim and White in 1905, this peristyle was built on the site of the 1860s-era Promenade Drive Shelter along the southwest shore of the Prospect Park Lake; the Prospect Park Peristyle is designed in the Renaissance architectural style. It consists of a raised platform located two steps above ground level. An entablature of terracotta runs atop the structure; the building was constructed as a temporary refuge from sun. Grecian Shelter was rehabilitated in 1966 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972; the peristyle is a New York City designated landmark, having been declared as such on December 10, 1968. List of New York City Landmarks National Register of Historic Places listings in Kings County, New York