1.
Village
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A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town, with a population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Though often located in areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods. Villages are normally permanent, with fixed dwellings, however, transient villages can occur, further, the dwellings of a village are fairly close to one another, not scattered broadly over the landscape, as a dispersed settlement. In the past, villages were a form of community for societies that practise subsistence agriculture. In Great Britain, a hamlet earned the right to be called a village when it built a church, in many cultures, towns and cities were few, with only a small proportion of the population living in them. The Industrial Revolution attracted people in numbers to work in mills and factories. This also enabled specialization of labor and crafts, and development of many trades, the trend of urbanization continues, though not always in connection with industrialization. Although many patterns of life have existed, the typical village was small. Homes were situated together for sociability and defence, and land surrounding the living quarters was farmed, Traditional fishing villages were based on artisan fishing and located adjacent to fishing grounds. The soul of India lives in its villages, declared M. K. Gandhi at the beginning of 20th century, according to the 2011 census of India,68. 84% of Indians live in 640,867 different villages. The size of these villages varies considerably,236,004 Indian villages have a population of fewer than 500, while 3,976 villages have a population of 10, 000+. Most of the villages have their own temple, mosque, or church, auyl is a Kazakh word meaning village in Kazakhstan. According to the 2009 census of Kazakhstan,42. 7% of Kazakhs live in 8172 different villages, to refer to this concept along with the word auyl often used the slavic word selo in Northern Kazakhstan. Peoples Republic of China In mainland China, villages 村 are divisions under township Zh, 乡 or town Zh, Republic of China In the Republic of China, villages are divisions under townships or county-controlled cities. The village is called a tsuen or cūn under a rural township, japan South Korea In Indonesia, depending on the principles they are administered, villages are called Kampung or Desa. A Desa is administered according to traditions and customary law, while a kelurahan is administered along more modern principles, Desa are generally located in rural areas while kelurahan are generally urban subdivisions. A village head is respectively called kepala desa or lurah, both are elected by the local community. A desa or kelurahan is the subdivision of a kecamatan, in turn the subdivision of a kabupaten or kota, the same general concept applies all over Indonesia
2.
Townland
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A townland is a small geographical division of land used in Ireland. The townland system is of Gaelic origin, pre-dating the Norman invasion, however, some townland names and boundaries come from Norman manors, plantation divisions, or later creations of the Ordnance Survey. The total number of inhabited townlands was 60,679 in 1911, the total number recognised by the Irish Place Names database as of 2014 was 61,098, including uninhabited townlands, mainly small islands. In Ireland a townland is generally the smallest administrative division of land, the term townland in English is derived from the Old English word tun, denoting an enclosure. The term describes the smallest unit of division in Ireland, based on various forms of Gaelic land division. The term baile, anglicised as bally, is the most dominant element used in Irish townland names, today the term bally denotes an urban settlement, but its precise meaning in ancient Ireland is unclear, as towns had no place in Gaelic social organisation. The modern Irish term for a townland is baile fearainn, the term fearainn means land, territory, quarter. Throughout most of Ulster townlands were known as ballyboes, and represented an area of economic value. In County Cavan similar units were called polls, and in Counties Fermanagh and these names appear to be of English origin, but had become naturalised long before 1600. In modern townland names the prefix pol- is widely found throughout western Ireland, in County Cavan, which contains over half of all townlands in Ulster with the prefix pol-, some should probably be better translated as the poll of. In County Tyrone the following hierarchy of divisions was used, ballybetagh, ballyboe, sessiagh, gort. In County Fermanagh the divisions were ballybetagh, quarter and tate, further subdivisions in Fermanagh appear to be related to liquid or grain measures such as gallons, pottles and pints. In Ulster the ballybetagh was the unit controlled by an Irish sept. Fragmentation of ballybetaghs resulted in units consisting of four, eight, one of these fragmented units, the quarter, representing a quarter of a ballybetagh, was the universal land denomination recorded in the survey of County Donegal conducted in 1608. In the early 17th century 20 per cent of the area of western Ulster was under the control of the church. These termon lands consisted likewise of ballybetaghs and ballyboes, but were held by erenaghs instead of sept leaders, other units of land division used throughout Ireland include, In County Tipperary, capell lands and quatermeers. A capell land consisted of around 20 great acres, in the province of Connacht, quarters and cartrons, a quarter being reckoned as four cartrons, and each cartron being 30 acres. The quarter has also been anglicised as carrow, carhoo or caracute, in County Clare, as in Connacht, quarters, half-quarters, cartrons and sessiagh
3.
Northern Ireland
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Northern Ireland is a constituent unit of the United Kingdom in the north-east of Ireland. It is variously described as a country, province, region, or part of the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland shares a border to the south and west with the Republic of Ireland. In 2011, its population was 1,810,863, constituting about 30% of the total population. Northern Ireland was created in 1921, when Ireland was partitioned between Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland by an act of the British parliament, Northern Ireland has historically been the most industrialised region of Ireland. After declining as a result of the political and social turmoil of the Troubles, its economy has grown significantly since the late 1990s. Unemployment in Northern Ireland peaked at 17. 2% in 1986, dropping to 6. 1% for June–August 2014,58. 2% of those unemployed had been unemployed for over a year. Prominent artists and sports persons from Northern Ireland include Van Morrison, Rory McIlroy, Joey Dunlop, Wayne McCullough, some people from Northern Ireland prefer to identify as Irish while others prefer to identify as British. Cultural links between Northern Ireland, the rest of Ireland, and the rest of the UK are complex, in many sports, the island of Ireland fields a single team, a notable exception being association football. Northern Ireland competes separately at the Commonwealth Games, and people from Northern Ireland may compete for either Great Britain or Ireland at the Olympic Games. The region that is now Northern Ireland was the bedrock of the Irish war of resistance against English programmes of colonialism in the late 16th century, the English-controlled Kingdom of Ireland had been declared by the English king Henry VIII in 1542, but Irish resistance made English control fragmentary. Victories by English forces in war and further Protestant victories in the Williamite War in Ireland toward the close of the 17th century solidified Anglican rule in Ireland. In Northern Ireland, the victories of the Siege of Derry and their intention was to materially disadvantage the Catholic community and, to a lesser extent, the Presbyterian community. In the context of open institutional discrimination, the 18th century saw secret, militant societies develop in communities in the region and act on sectarian tensions in violent attacks. Following this, in an attempt to quell sectarianism and force the removal of discriminatory laws, the new state, formed in 1801, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, was governed from a single government and parliament based in London. Between 1717 and 1775 some 250,000 people from Ulster emigrated to the British North American colonies and it is estimated that there are more than 27 million Scotch-Irish Americans now living in the US. By the close of the century, autonomy for Ireland within the United Kingdom, in 1912, after decades of obstruction from the House of Lords, Home Rule became a near-certainty. A clash between the House of Commons and House of Lords over a controversial budget produced the Parliament Act 1911, which enabled the veto of the Lords to be overturned. The House of Lords veto had been the unionists main guarantee that Home Rule would not be enacted, in 1914, they smuggled thousands of rifles and rounds of ammunition from Imperial Germany for use by the Ulster Volunteers, a paramilitary organisation opposed to the implementation of Home Rule
4.
Royal Irish Constabulary
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The Royal Irish Constabulary was the armed police force of the United Kingdom in Ireland from the early nineteenth century until 1922. About seventy-five percent of the RIC were Roman Catholic and about twenty-five percent were of various Protestant denominations, the Catholics mainly constables and the Protestants officers. In consequence of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, the RIC was disbanded in 1922 and was replaced by the Garda Síochána in the Irish Free State and the Royal Ulster Constabulary in Northern Ireland. The 1822 Act established a force in each province with chief constables, by 1841 this force numbered over 8,600 men. The original force had been reorganised under The Act of 1836, the discipline was strict and the pay low. The police faced civil unrest among the Irish rural poor, and was involved in bloody confrontations during the period of the Tithe War, other deployments were against organisations like the Ribbonmen, which attacked landlords, their property and stock. This was followed by a period of relative calm, the advent of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, founded in 1858, brought a plan for an armed uprising. Direct action began with the Fenian Rising of 1867, Fenians attacked on the more isolated police barracks and smaller stations. This rebellion was put down with ruthless efficiency, the police had infiltrated the Fenians with informers. The RIC presided over a decline in general crime around the country. The unstable rural unrest of the nineteenth century characterised by secret organisations. Policing generally became a routine of controlling misdemeanours such as moonshine distilling, public drunkenness, minor theft, a Land War broke out in the 1879–82 Depression period, causing some general unrest. In Belfast, with its boom, the working population mushroomed. Much of the increase arose from Catholic migration and there were serious riots in 1857,1864,1872 and 1886. As a result, the small Belfast Town Police civic force was disbanded, likewise in 1870, the RIC took over the duties of the Londonderry Borough Police. About 70% of the force in Belfast declared their support of the strikers and were encouraged by Larkin to carry out their own strike for higher wages. It never came to fruition, however, as dissident policemen were transferred out of Belfast four days before the strike was to begin, barrett and six other constables were dismissed and extra British Army troops were deployed to Belfast. The dock strike ended on 28 August 1907, the RICs existence was, increasingly troubled by the rise of the Home Rule campaign in the early twentieth century period prior to World War I
5.
Ulster
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Ulster is a province in the north of the island of Ireland. In ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths ruled by a rí ruirech, the definition of the province was fluid from early to medieval times. It took a shape in the reign of King James I of England when all the counties of Ireland were eventually shired. This process of evolving conquest had been under way since the Norman invasion of Ireland, particularly as advanced by the Cambro-Norman magnates Hugh de Lacy, Ulster was a central topic role in the parliamentary debates that eventually resulted in the Government of Ireland Act 1920. Under the terms of the Act, Ireland was divided into two territories, Southern Ireland and Northern Ireland, with the passing through the province. While these six counties and two boroughs were all in the province of Ulster, three other counties of the province – Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan – were assigned to the Irish Free State. Ulster has no function for local government purposes in either country. However, for the purposes of ISO-3166-2, Ulster is used to refer to the three counties of Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan only, which are given country sub-division code IE-U. It has also suggested to have derived from Uladh plus the Norse suffix ster. The Irish name, Cúige Uladh, means the province of the Ulaid, the Ulaidh were a group of tribes who dwelt in the region. Ulaidh has historically been anglicised as Ulagh or Ullagh and Latinised as Ulidia or Ultonia, the latter two have yielded the terms Ulidian and Ultonian. Words that have used in English are Ullish and Ulsterman/Ulsterwoman. Northern Ireland is often referred to as Ulster, despite including only six of Ulsters nine counties and this usage is most common amongst people in Northern Ireland who are unionist, although it is also used by the media throughout the United Kingdom. Most Irish nationalists object to the use of Ulster in this context, Ulster has a population of just over 2 million people and an area of 21,552 square kilometres. About 62% of the area of Ulster is in the UK while the remaining 38% is in the Republic of Ireland. Ulsters biggest city, Belfast, has an population of over half a million inhabitants, making it the second-largest city on the island of Ireland. Three Ulster counties – Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan – form part of the Republic of Ireland, about half of Ulsters population lives in counties Antrim and Down. 8% to 42. 7%. While the traditional counties continue to demarcate areas of government in the Republic of Ireland
6.
Siege of Derry
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The Siege of Derry, was the first major event in the Williamite War in Ireland. While the gates of the old walled city were closed in December 1688. The siege lasted three and a half months, ending on 30 July 1689 when relief ships bringing an English army sailed down Lough Foyle. The siege is commemorated yearly in August by the Apprentice Boys of Derry, in Scotland, the privy council asked William to assume responsibility for the government in January 1689, and he and Mary were formally offered the Scottish throne in March. The situation was different in Ireland where most of the population were Catholics, Irish Catholics were hoping that James would re-grant them lands, which had been seized from them after the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland. James thus looked to Ireland to muster support in re-gaining his kingdoms just as his father, Richard Talbot, who was acting as Jamess viceroy in Ireland, was eager to ensure that all strongholds in the country were held by garrisons loyal to James. He focused on the province of Ulster, which had been the most heavily planted by British Protestant colonists. By November 1688, Enniskillen and Derry were the two garrisons in Ulster that were not wholly loyal to James and these became the point of the first stage in the Williamite war in Ireland. The elderly Alexander MacDonnell, 3rd Earl of Antrim, a Jacobite, was ordered to replace these two garrisons with forces loyal to King James and he agreed, but wasted several weeks searching for men who were at least six feet tall. A force of about 1,200 Scottish Highland Redshanks then set out for Derry, on 7 December, with the army a short distance away, thirteen apprentice boys seized the city keys and locked the gates. On 10 December, King James fled London and he was caught, but fled a second time on 23 December and made his way to France. Jamess first cousin, King Louis XIV of France, said he would help James regain power, in London on 13 February 1689, William and Mary were crowned. On 12 March, James landed in Kinsale with 6000 French soldiers and he took Dublin and marched north with an army of Irish and French Catholics. In April 1689 reinforcements from England arrived under the command of Colonel Cunningham and he was under instructions to take his orders from the Derry City Governor, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Lundy. Lundy advised Colonel Cunningham to leave as arrangements had been made for the city to be surrendered and he wrote on 15 April that without an immediate supply of money and provisions this place must fall very soon into the enemys hands. Lundy called a meeting with several of his most loyal supporters to discuss surrender, news of the meeting spread, angering many of the citizens. That night, Lundy and many left the city and took ship to Scotland. The citys defence was overseen by Major Henry Baker, Colonel Adam Murray, as the Jacobite army neared, all the buildings outside the city walls were set alight by the defenders to prevent them being used as cover by the besiegers
7.
George VI
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George VI was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death. He was the last Emperor of India and the first Head of the Commonwealth, known as Albert until his accession, George VI was born in the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria, and was named after his great-grandfather Albert, Prince Consort. As the second son of King George V, he was not expected to inherit the throne and spent his life in the shadow of his elder brother. He attended naval college as a teenager, and served in the Royal Navy, in 1920, he was made Duke of York. He married Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon in 1923 and they had two daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, in the mid-1920s, he had speech therapy for a stammer, which he never fully overcame. Georges elder brother ascended the throne as Edward VIII upon the death of their father in 1936, however, later that year Edward revealed his desire to marry divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson. British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin advised Edward that for political and religious reasons he could not marry a divorced woman, Edward abdicated in order to marry, and George ascended the throne as the third monarch of the House of Windsor. During Georges reign, the break-up of the British Empire and its transition into the Commonwealth of Nations accelerated, the parliament of the Irish Free State removed direct mention of the monarch from the countrys constitution on the day of his accession. The following year, a new Irish constitution changed the name of the state to Ireland, from 1939, the Empire and Commonwealth – except Ireland – was at war with Nazi Germany. War with Italy and Japan followed in 1940 and 1941, respectively, though Britain and its allies were ultimately victorious in 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union rose as pre-eminent world powers and the British Empire declined. After the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947, George remained king of countries, but relinquished the title of Emperor of India in June 1948. Ireland formally declared itself a republic and left the Commonwealth in 1949, George adopted the new title of Head of the Commonwealth. He was beset by problems in the later years of his reign. He was succeeded by his eldest daughter, Elizabeth II, George was born at York Cottage, on the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk, during the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria. His father was Prince George, Duke of York, the second and eldest-surviving son of the Prince and his mother was the Duchess of York, the eldest child and only daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Teck. His birthday was the 34th anniversary of the death of his great-grandfather, Albert, uncertain of how the Prince Consorts widow, Queen Victoria, would take the news of the birth, the Prince of Wales wrote to the Duke of York that the Queen had been rather distressed. Two days later, he again, I really think it would gratify her if you yourself proposed the name Albert to her. Consequently, he was baptised Albert Frederick Arthur George at St. Mary Magdalenes Church near Sandringham three months later, within the family, he was known informally as Bertie
8.
Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother
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Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was the wife of King George VI and the mother of Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon. She was the last Empress consort of India, born into a family of British nobility, she came to prominence in 1923 when she married Albert, Duke of York, the second son of King George V and Queen Mary. The couple and their daughters embodied traditional ideas of family and public service and she undertook a variety of public engagements and became known as the Smiling Duchess because of her consistent public expression. In 1936, her husband became king when his brother, Edward VIII. She accompanied her husband on diplomatic tours to France and North America before the start of World War II, during the war, her seemingly indomitable spirit provided moral support to the British public. In recognition of her role as an asset to British interests, after the war, her husbands health deteriorated and she was widowed at the age of 51. Her elder daughter, aged 25, became the new queen, on the death of Queen Mary in 1953, Elizabeth became the most senior member of the British royal family after the sovereign, and was viewed as the family matriarch. In her later years, she was a popular member of the family. She continued a public life until just a few months before her death at the age of 101, seven weeks after the death of her younger daughter. Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was the youngest daughter and the ninth of ten children of Claude Bowes-Lyon, Lord Glamis, other possible locations include Forbes House in Ham, London, the home of her maternal grandmother, Louisa Scott. Her birth was registered at Hitchin, Hertfordshire, near the Strathmores English country house, St Pauls Walden Bury, which was also given as her birthplace in the census the following year. She was christened there on 23 September 1900, in the parish church, All Saints. She spent much of her childhood at St Pauls Walden and at Glamis Castle and she was educated at home by a governess until the age of eight, and was fond of field sports, ponies and dogs. When she started school in London, she astonished her teachers by precociously beginning an essay with two Greek words from Xenophons Anabasis and her best subjects were literature and scripture. After returning to education under a German Jewish governess, Käthe Kübler. On her fourteenth birthday, Britain declared war on Germany, four of her brothers served in the army. Her elder brother, Fergus, an officer in the Black Watch Regiment, was killed in action at the Battle of Loos in 1915, another brother, Michael, was reported missing in action on 28 April 1917. Three weeks later, the family discovered he had captured after being wounded
9.
Protestantism
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Protestantism is a form of Christianity which originated with the Reformation, a movement against what its followers considered to be errors in the Roman Catholic Church. It is one of the three divisions of Christendom, together with Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The term derives from the letter of protestation from German Lutheran princes in 1529 against an edict of the Diet of Speyer condemning the teachings of Martin Luther as heretical. Although there were earlier breaks from or attempts to reform the Roman Catholic Church—notably by Peter Waldo, John Wycliffe, Protestants reject the notion of papal supremacy and deny the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, but disagree among themselves regarding the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. The Five solae summarize the reformers basic differences in theological beliefs, in the 16th century, Lutheranism spread from Germany into Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, the Baltic states, and Iceland. Reformed churches were founded in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Scotland, Switzerland and France by such reformers as John Calvin, Huldrych Zwingli, the political separation of the Church of England from Rome under King Henry VIII brought England and Wales into this broad Reformation movement. Protestants developed their own culture, which made major contributions in education, the humanities and sciences, the political and social order, the economy and the arts, some Protestant denominations do have a worldwide scope and distribution of membership, while others are confined to a single country. A majority of Protestants are members of a handful of families, Adventism, Anglicanism, Baptist churches, Reformed churches, Lutheranism, Methodism. Nondenominational, evangelical, charismatic, independent and other churches are on the rise, and constitute a significant part of Protestant Christianity. Six princes of the Holy Roman Empire and rulers of fourteen Imperial Free Cities, the edict reversed concessions made to the Lutherans with the approval of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V three years earlier. During the Reformation, the term was used outside of the German politics. The word evangelical, which refers to the gospel, was more widely used for those involved in the religious movement. Nowadays, this word is still preferred among some of the historical Protestant denominations in the Lutheran and Calvinist traditions in Europe, above all the term is used by Protestant bodies in the German-speaking area, such as the EKD. In continental Europe, an Evangelical is either a Lutheran or a Calvinist, the German word evangelisch means Protestant, and is different from the German evangelikal, which refers to churches shaped by Evangelicalism. The English word evangelical usually refers to Evangelical Protestant churches, and it traces its roots back to the Puritans in England, where Evangelicalism originated, and then was brought to the United States. Protestantism as a term is now used in contradistinction to the other major Christian traditions, i. e. Roman Catholicism. Initially, Protestant became a term to mean any adherent to the Reformation movement in Germany and was taken up by Lutherans. Even though Martin Luther himself insisted on Christian or Evangelical as the only acceptable names for individuals who professed Christ, French and Swiss Protestants preferred the word reformed, which became a popular, neutral and alternative name for Calvinists
10.
Pennsylvania
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Pennsylvania /ˌpɛnsᵻlˈveɪnjə/, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state located in the northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The Appalachian Mountains run through its middle, Pennsylvania is the 33rd largest, the 5th most populous, and the 9th most densely populated of the 50 United States. The states five most populous cities are Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown, Erie, the state capital, and its ninth-largest city, is Harrisburg. Pennsylvania has 140 miles of shoreline along Lake Erie and the Delaware Estuary. The state is one of the 13 original founding states of the United States, it came into being in 1681 as a result of a land grant to William Penn. Part of Pennsylvania, together with the present State of Delaware, had earlier been organized as the Colony of New Sweden and it was the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, on December 12,1787. Independence Hall, where the United States Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution were drafted, is located in the states largest city of Philadelphia, during the American Civil War, the Battle of Gettysburg, was fought in the south central region of the state. Valley Forge near Philadelphia was General Washingtons headquarters during the winter of 1777–78. Pennsylvania is 170 miles north to south and 283 miles east to west, of a total 46,055 square miles,44,817 square miles are land,490 square miles are inland waters, and 749 square miles are waters in Lake Erie. It is the 33rd largest state in the United States, Pennsylvania has 51 miles of coastline along Lake Erie and 57 miles of shoreline along the Delaware Estuary. Cities include Philadelphia, Reading, Lebanon and Lancaster in the southeast, Pittsburgh in the southwest, the tri-cities of Allentown, Bethlehem, the northeast includes the former anthracite coal mining communities of Scranton, Wilkes-Barre, Pittston City, and Hazleton. Erie is located in the northwest, the state has 5 regions, namely the Allegheny Plateau, Ridge and Valley, Atlantic Coastal Plain, Piedmont, and the Erie Plain. Straddling two major zones, the majority of the state, with the exception of the corner, has a humid continental climate. The largest city, Philadelphia, has characteristics of the humid subtropical climate that covers much of Delaware. Moving toward the interior of the state, the winter climate becomes colder, the number of cloudy days increase. Western areas of the state, particularly locations near Lake Erie, can receive over 100 inches of snowfall annually, the state may be subject to severe weather from spring through summer into fall. Tornadoes occur annually in the state, sometimes in large numbers, the Tuscarora Nation took up temporary residence in the central portion of Pennsylvania ca. Both the Dutch and the English claimed both sides of the Delaware River as part of their lands in America
11.
Thomas Maclear
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Sir Thomas Maclear was an Irish-born South African astronomer who became Her Majestys astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope. He was born in Newtownstewart, County Tyrone, Ireland, the eldest son of Rev James Maclear, in 1808 he was sent to England to be educated in the medical profession. After passing his examinations, in 1815 he was accepted into the Royal College of Surgeons of England and he then worked as house-surgeon in the Bedford Infirmary. In 1823 he went into partnership with his uncle at Biggleswade, two years later in 1825 he was married to Mary Pearse, the daughter of Theed Pearse, Clerk of the Peace for the county of Bedford. Maclear had a keen interest in astronomy, and would begin a long association with the Royal Astronomical Society. He worked with John Herschel until 1838, performing a survey of the southern sky, the Maclears and Herschels formed a close friendship, the wives drawn together by the unusual occupations of their husbands and the raising of their large families. Mary Maclear, like Margaret Herschel, was a beauty and intelligent. Sir George Everest visited the Cape in 1820 and visited the site of La Cailles measurements, from his experience in the Himalayas he believed that the presence of considerable mountain masses in the Cape could have caused false measurements to be made by La Caille. Between 1841 and 1848, Maclear would be occupied in performing a survey for the purpose of recalculating the dimensions. He became close friends with David Livingstone, and they shared a common interest in the exploration of Africa and he performed many other useful scientific activities, including collecting meteorological, magnetic and tide data. Two years later he was granted a pension, but did not retire from the observatory until 1870 and he lived thereafter at Grey Villa, Mowbray. By 1876, he had lost his sight, and he died three years later in Cape Town, South Africa and he is buried next to his wife in the grounds of the Royal Observatory. Knighted in 1860 for his achievements as an astronomer, lalande Prize Royal Medal of the Royal Society, for his measurement of an arc of the meridian in the 1840s. John Maclear, his son, was an Admiral in the Royal Navy, london, Smith, Elder & Co. Thomas Maclear 1794 -1879 — SA History Maclear family Thomas Maclear biography
12.
Strabane
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Strabane, historically spelt Straban, is a town in West Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It was the headquarters of the former Strabane District Council, Strabane has a population of around 18,000, which is mainly Irish nationalist. It is the second-largest town in Tyrone, after Omagh and it lies on the east bank of the River Foyle and is roughly equidistant from Omagh, Derry City and Letterkenny. The River Foyle marks the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, on the other side of the river is the smaller town of Lifford, which is the county town of County Donegal. The Mourne flows through the centre of the town, and meets the Finn to form the Foyle River, in the 1600s the town was settled by Scottish families, an action that preceded the Plantation of Ulster. In 1608 during ODohertys Rebellion most of the fled to the safety of Lifford following Sir Cahir ODohertys Burning of Derry. Strabane once had the distinction of the highest unemployment rate in the Industrial World. It is one of the most economically deprived towns in the United Kingdom, Strabane suffered huge economic damage in 1987 when much of the centre of the town was flooded. Strabane had been moved out of the top 20 in the 2007 edition, Strabane was once the most bombed town in Europe per size and was the most bombed town in Northern Ireland. Many civilians and members of the security forces were killed or injured in the area over the course of the Troubles, many British Army regiments from England, Scotland and Wales served in Strabane at various times during the Troubles in the Barracks at the locally named Camels hump. As a result of the Good Friday Agreement, there is no longer any British Army presence in the town, Strabane became involved in the Ulster Project International, sending Catholic and Protestant teenagers to the United States for prejudice-reduction work. The Irish gauge 5 ft 3 in Londonderry and Enniskillen Railway reached Strabane in 1847, Omagh in 1852, the Great Northern Railway took over the L&ER in 1883. The Finn Valley Railway opened from Strabane to Stranorlar in 1863, the FV was originally Irish gauge but in 1892 it merged with the 3 ft narrow gauge West Donegal Railway to form the Donegal Railway and was reduced to the same narrow gauge for through running. The Donegal Railway opened its own line to Derry in 1900, in 1906 the GNR and Northern Counties Committee jointly took over the Donegal Railway, making it the County Donegal Railways Joint Committee. The 3 ft gauge Strabane and Letterkenny Railway opened in 1909 and was worked by the Joint Committee, the narrow gauge lines made Strabane one of the most important railway connections for County Donegal. The partition of Ireland in 1922 turned the boundary with County Donegal into an international frontier and this changed trade patterns to the railways detriment and placed border posts on the Joint Committees FV and S&L lines and on the GNR line to Derry. Stops for customs inspections greatly delayed trains and disrupted timekeeping, the Joint Committees Strabane-Derry line was closed in 1954, followed by the remainder of the narrow gauge system in 1960. In 1958 the Ulster Transport Authority took over the remaining GNR lines on the Northern Ireland side of the border, in accordance with The Benson Report submitted to the Northern Ireland Government in 1963, the UTA closed the former GNR line through Strabane to Derry in 1965
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