Matt Grace
Matthew Aaron Grace is an American professional baseball pitcher for the Washington Nationals of Major League Baseball. Grace graduated from Palos Verdes High School and played college baseball at the University of California, Los Angeles for the Bruins from 2008 to 2010, he was a relief pitcher, but started six games during his career. Over his three-year career at UCLA, he pitched in 72 games, going 4–4 with a 3.92 earned run average and 75 strikeouts. Grace was drafted by the Washington Nationals in the eighth round of the 2010 Major League Baseball Draft, he was converted into a starting pitcher with the Nationals and made his professional debut that season with the Gulf Coast Nationals. After spending three seasons without success starting, Grace was moved back to relieving before the 2013 season. Grace spent 2014 with the Double-A Hagerstown Suns and Triple-A Syracuse Chiefs. Grace made his major league debut with the Nationals on April 22, 2015, pitching a scoreless inning in relief against the St. Louis Cardinals.
After an outing against the Cincinnati Reds on May 31, 2015, in which he gave up four runs without recording an out, the Nationals optioned Grace back to Syracuse. Grace spent most of the remainder of the 2015 season and the 2016 season with the Chiefs, being promoted for brief stints in both seasons after rosters expanded in September. In the 2017 season, a shaky first-half performance by the Nationals' bullpen and a string of injuries to major league pitchers meant Grace served as a regular up-and-down reliever, shuttling between the Nationals and the Chiefs as needed. On July 14, 2017, Grace was called upon with the bases loaded and two outs in the ninth inning of a 5–0 game against the Reds, in his first appearance at Great American Ball Park since May 31, 2015, induced a game-ending groundout to secure his first major league save. Career statistics and player information from MLB, or Baseball-Reference, or The Baseball Cube, or Baseball-Reference UCLA Bruins bio
Sable Starr
Sable Starr was a noted American groupie described as the "queen of the groupie scene" in Los Angeles during the early 1970s. She admitted during an interview published in the June 1973 edition of Star Magazine that she was acquainted with Iggy Pop, Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart, Alice Cooper, David Bowie, Marc Bolan. Starr first attended concerts around Los Angeles with older friends who had dropped out of school in late 1968, she claims to have lost her virginity at age 12 with Spirit guitarist Randy California after a gig at Topanga, California. She had a younger sister, Corel Shields, who according to Chris Charlesworth was involved with Iggy Pop in Autumn 1973, when Corel was 13-14. Pop immortalized his involvement with Starr herself in the 1996 song "Look Away." It refers to Sable being thirteen, which would be in 1970. I slept with Sable when she was 13, Her parents were too rich to do anything, She rocked her way around L. A.'Til a New York Doll carried her away… Starr became one of the first "baby groupies" who in the early 1970s frequented the Rainbow Bar and Grill, the Whiskey A Go Go, Rodney Bingenheimer's English Disco.
The girls were named as such because of their young age. She got started after a friend invited her to the Whiskey A Go Go at the age of 14. Starr described herself at that period as having been "nuts to begin with. I always liked getting into trouble", she had considered herself unattractive, so she had a nose job when she was 15. During the time Starr was a groupie, she continued to live at home with her family and attended Palos Verdes High School to placate her parents. In 1973 she gave a candid interview for the short-lived Los Angeles-based Star Magazine, boasted to the journalist that she considered herself to be "the best" of all the local groupies, she claimed that she was acquainted with some of rock music's leading musicians, such as Jeff Beck, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart, Marc Bolan, Alice Cooper. She added that her favorite rock star acquaintance was Led Robert Plant; when asked how she attracted the attention of the musicians, she maintained it was because of the outrageous glam rock clothing she habitually wore.
She was photographed alongside well-known rock musicians. Starr admitted to having gotten into fights with rival groupies and she had a confrontation with Bianca Jagger, who at the time was married to Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger. According to Starr, she knocked on Bianca's hotel room and when the latter opened the door she was told "in a few four-letter words to'get lost'". Lori Mattix, a fellow baby groupie, claimed that Starr once told her to "keep her hands" off of Jimmy Page, saying "if you touch him, I will shoot you. He’s mine.” Her closest friends in Los Angeles were fellow groupies Shray Mecham and "Queenie". Model Bebe Buell described Starr as having been one of the two top Los Angeles groupies of the era, adding that "every rock star who came to Los Angeles wanted to meet her", she ran away from home when she was 16 after meeting Johnny Thunders, guitarist in the glam rock band the New York Dolls. She went to live with him in New York City, their relationship didn't last due to his violent jealousy and drug addiction.
He had wanted to marry her after she became pregnant with his child, but she refused and instead had an abortion. Tired of the physical abuse Thunders inflicted upon her, unable to adjust to the New York lifestyle, Starr moved back to Los Angeles, she claimed. After I was with him, I just wasn't Sable Starr anymore, he destroyed the Sable Starr thing". She made frequent visits to New York where she had an affair with Richard Hell, befriended Nancy Spungen, participated in the local burgeoning punk rock scene. By the early 1980s, she was no longer part of the groupie milieu, she moved to Lake Tahoe, Nevada. She became a table game dealer at Carson Valley Inn in Minden until shortly before her death. Starr died at her home in Nevada on April 18, 2009 of brain cancer at the age of 51, she was survived by her partner, Bill Reiner, her daughter, Allie Shields, her son, Christian Sharpsteen
Palos Verdes Estates, California
Palos Verdes Estates is a city in Los Angeles County, United States, situated on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. The city was master-planned by the noted American landscape architect and planner Frederick Law Olmsted Jr; the city is located along the Southern California coastline of the Pacific Ocean. The population was 13,438 at the 2010 census, up from 13,340 in the 2000 census. According to the 2000 U. S. Census, Palos Verdes Estates is the 81st richest place in the United States with at least 1,000 households; the 90274 ZIP code was ranked the 47th most expensive housing area among high property value U. S. ZIP codes in a 2007 study by Forbes.com. Palos Verdes is particularly well known for its high-performing schools, with various national publications ranking the high school between 8th and 44th best in the nation in the 2000s and 2010s. Palos Verdes Estates was established as a subdivision in 1923, with 3,200 acres carved out of the former Rancho Palos Verdes property of over 16,000 acres. Frank Vanderlip established both a land syndicate holding the Palos Verdes peninsula, a real estate development trust for the Palos Verdes Estates subdivision.
The Commonwealth Trust Company filed the Palos Verdes Protective Restrictions in Los Angeles County in 1923. These restrictions established rules for all land owners; the developer was required to set aside half of the land for common use, including roads and parks, but built bridle paths, a golf course, retained several miles of coastline free of development. No less than ninety percent of the remaining land was required to be used for single-family homes; the designers of Palos Verdes Estates, Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. and Charles Cheney, used deed restrictions as a method of controlling development of the subdivision after many of the lots would have been sold. The deed restrictions prohibited nuisance businesses, such as polluting industries, but bars and cemeteries. None of the lots or homes could be sold to or rented by a non-white. An art jury reviewed all building plans, regulating any structure in regard to style and small details like color and the pitch of the roof; the construction of fences and hedges were subject to evaluation by the art jury.
At the time of the city's incorporation in 1939, the business and shop area around Malaga Cove had most of the Peninsula's earlier buildings. The Malaga Cove Plaza building of the Palos Verdes Public Library, designed by Pasadena architect Myron Hunt, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995. Palos Verdes Estates was one of the earliest masterplanned communities in the United States. Palos Verdes Estates is located at 33°47′13″N 118°23′48″W. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 4.8 square miles, over 99% of it land. The 2010 United States Census reported that Palos Verdes Estates had a population of 13,438; the population density was 2,814.8 people per square mile. The racial makeup of Palos Verdes Estates was 10,346 White, 161 African American, 21 Native American, 2,322 Asian, 8 Pacific Islander, 94 from other races, 486 from two or more races. There were 631 people of any race; the Census reported that 13,421 people lived in households, 17 lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, 0 were institutionalized.
There were 5,066 households, out of which 1,686 had children under the age of 18 living in them, 3,649 were opposite-sex married couples living together, 296 had a female householder with no husband present, 138 had a male householder with no wife present. There were 91 unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, 26 same-sex married couples or partnerships. 848 households were made up of individuals and 534 had someone living alone, 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.65. There were 4,083 families; the population was spread out with 3,113 people under the age of 18, 588 people aged 18 to 24, 1,787 people aged 25 to 44, 4,702 people aged 45 to 64, 3,248 people who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 49.9 years. For every 100 females, there were 95.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 93.0 males. There were 5,283 housing units at an average density of 1,106.6 per square mile, of which 4,496 were owner-occupied, 570 were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 0.7%.
11,958 people lived in owner-occupied housing units and 1,463 people lived in rental housing units. According to the 2010-2014 U. S. Census, the median income for a household in Palos Verdes Estates was $171,328; the per capita income for the city was $87,408. As of the census of 2000, there were 13,340 people, 4,993 households, 4,119 families residing in the city; the population density was 2,784.9 inhabitants per square mile. There were 5,202 housing units at an average density of 1,086.0 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 78.3% White, 17.1% Asian, 2.0% African American, 0.1% Native American, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 0.6% from other races, 2.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.8% of the population. There were 4,993 households out of which 32.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 75.7% were married couples living together, 4.7% had a
The Falcon and the Snowman
The Falcon and the Snowman is a 1985 American spy drama film directed by John Schlesinger. The screenplay by Steven Zaillian is based on the 1979 book The Falcon and the Snowman: A True Story of Friendship and Espionage by Robert Lindsey, tells the true story of two young American men, Christopher Boyce and Andrew Daulton Lee, who sold US security secrets to the Soviet Union; the film features the song "This Is Not America," written and performed by David Bowie and the Pat Metheny Group. Boyce, an expert in the sport of falconry and son of an FBI office employee, gets a job at a civilian defense contractor working in the so-called "Black Vault," a secure communication facility through which flows information on some of the most classified U. S. operations in the world. Boyce becomes disillusioned with the U. S. government through his new position after reading a misrouted communiqué dealing with the CIA's plan to depose the Prime Minister of Australia. Frustrated by this duplicity, Boyce decides to repay his government by passing classified secrets to the Soviets.
Lee is a drug addict and minor cocaine smuggler, called "the Snowman," who has frustrated and alienated his family. Lee agrees to contact and deal with the KGB's agents in Mexico on Boyce's behalf, motivated not by idealism but by what he perceives as an opportunity to make money, they settle in Costa Rica; as the pair become involved with espionage, Lee's ambition to create a major espionage business coupled with his excessive drug use begins to alienate the two from each other. Alex, their Soviet handler, becomes reluctant to deal through Lee as the middleman because of Lee's periods of irrationality. Boyce wants to end the espionage so that he can resume a normal life with his girlfriend Lana and attend college, he meets with Lee's KGB handler to explain the situation. Lee is desperate to regain the Soviets' regard after realizing that the KGB no longer needs him as a courier. Lee is observed tossing a note over the fence at the Soviet embassy in Mexico City, he is arrested by Mexican police and a U.
S. Foreign Service officer accompanies him to the police station; when the police search his pockets and find film and a postcard, they produce pictures of the same location, on the postcard, showing officers surrounding a dead man on the street. The Foreign Service officer explains that the Mexican police are trying to implicate him with the murder of a policeman; the police interrogate him. Hours he reveals that he is a Soviet spy. Told by the Mexican police that he will be deported, Lee is offered a choice of. Lee suggests Costa Rica, but the choice is between the Soviet Union and the United States. Lee reluctantly is arrested as he walks across the border. Knowing that he too will soon be captured, Boyce releases his pet falcon named Fawkes and sits down to wait. Moments U. S. Marshals and FBI agents capture him. Lee and Boyce are escorted to prison; the Falcon and The Snowman received positive notices upon release in 1985 and has an 80% on Rotten Tomatoes. Film critic Roger Ebert gave it a perfect four-star rating, citing one of the many strengths as that "it succeeds, in an admirably matter-of-fact way, in showing us how these two young men got in way over their heads.
This is a movie about spies. It's just the meticulously observant record of how naiveté, misplaced idealism and greed led to one of the most peculiar cases of treason in American history." The Falcon and the Snowman on IMDb The Falcon and the Snowman at AllMovie The Falcon and the Snowman at Rotten Tomatoes The Falcon and the Snowman at Box Office Mojo Lucy, the Peregrine Falcon used in the movie. Movie stills
Kyle Kazan
Kyle Kazan is the CEO of Beach Front Property Management, Inc. and co-founder and managing member of Beach Front Properties, LLC. Kazan has served as a special education teacher at LAUSD and a police officer at the Torrance Police Department. Kazan was born in 1967 in California to Richard and Anne Kazan, he was raised in the Palos Verdes peninsula and attended Palos Verdes High School from 1981-1985. Kazan attended University of Southern California where he received his BA in history in 1990. While at USC, Kazan was recruited to play basketball from 1987-1990 as both a point guard and shooting guard by future Hall of Fame coach George Raveling. After graduating from USC in 1990, Kazan became a special education teacher at LAUSD in 1991. Four years Kazan served in the patrol division of the Torrance Police Department with collateral assignments and training in gang enforcement and drugs recognition and eradication until 1999. Throughout his tenure, he led his department in felony arrests twice in two consecutive 6-month periods, testified as a court certified expert in drug sales.
Kazan began his real estate investment career with wife Diane Kazan in the late 1990s. In 1997, Kazan and James B. Rosenwald co-founded Beach Front Properties, LLC. A real estate investment company based in southern California. Together their portfolio spans residential and commercial properties across the U. S. China and Germany with a focus on distressed properties, earning Kazan a reputation as a "vulture investor" and expert in turning rundown properties into stable assets. In 1999, Kazan left the police department and founded Beach Front Property Management, Inc. a third party property management company headquartered in Long Beach, CA. In addition to real estate investing, Kazan has been involved in the management of venture capital. With Steve Persky from Dalton Investments, Kazan has co-managed the Dalton Distressed Mortgage Fund since 1997. Kazan has served as Director of the Dalton High Yield Mortgage Fund since 2012 as well as Kings Bay Investment Company, Ltd since 2013. Since 2010, Kazan has appeared at several public speeches organized by Law Enforcement Against Prohibition as an outspoken advocate both in favor of the legalization of marijuana and against the war on drugs.
He has made some television appearances to oppose the war on drugs including an interview conducted by CNN. Kazan currently presides at the Redondo Beach chapter Cancer Support Community as President of the Board of Directors. Cancer Support Community Redondo Beach ) Wellness Community Redondo Beach Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles Apartment Association of Southern California Cities Law Enforcement Against Prohibition
United States
The United States of America known as the United States or America, is a country composed of 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, various possessions. At 3.8 million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is smaller than the entire continent of Europe's 3.9 million square miles. With a population of over 327 million people, the U. S. is the third most populous country. The capital is Washington, D. C. and the largest city by population is New York City. Forty-eight states and the capital's federal district are contiguous in North America between Canada and Mexico; the State of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east and across the Bering Strait from Russia to the west. The State of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean; the U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, stretching across nine official time zones. The diverse geography and wildlife of the United States make it one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries.
Paleo-Indians migrated from Siberia to the North American mainland at least 12,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century; the United States emerged from the thirteen British colonies established along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the colonies following the French and Indian War led to the American Revolution, which began in 1775, the subsequent Declaration of Independence in 1776; the war ended in 1783 with the United States becoming the first country to gain independence from a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, with the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, being ratified in 1791 to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties; the United States embarked on a vigorous expansion across North America throughout the 19th century, acquiring new territories, displacing Native American tribes, admitting new states until it spanned the continent by 1848. During the second half of the 19th century, the Civil War led to the abolition of slavery.
By the end of the century, the United States had extended into the Pacific Ocean, its economy, driven in large part by the Industrial Revolution, began to soar. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a global military power; the United States emerged from World War II as a global superpower, the first country to develop nuclear weapons, the only country to use them in warfare, a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Sweeping civil rights legislation, notably the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968, outlawed discrimination based on race or color. During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed in the Space Race, culminating with the 1969 U. S. Moon landing; the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the world's sole superpower. The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation, it is a representative democracy.
The United States is a founding member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States, other international organizations. The United States is a developed country, with the world's largest economy by nominal GDP and second-largest economy by PPP, accounting for a quarter of global GDP; the U. S. economy is post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge-based activities, although the manufacturing sector remains the second-largest in the world. The United States is the world's largest importer and the second largest exporter of goods, by value. Although its population is only 4.3% of the world total, the U. S. holds 31% of the total wealth in the world, the largest share of global wealth concentrated in a single country. Despite wide income and wealth disparities, the United States continues to rank high in measures of socioeconomic performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP, worker productivity.
The United States is the foremost military power in the world, making up a third of global military spending, is a leading political and scientific force internationally. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a world map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America in honor of the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci; the first documentary evidence of the phrase "United States of America" is from a letter dated January 2, 1776, written by Stephen Moylan, Esq. to George Washington's aide-de-camp and Muster-Master General of the Continental Army, Lt. Col. Joseph Reed. Moylan expressed his wish to go "with full and ample powers from the United States of America to Spain" to seek assistance in the revolutionary war effort; the first known publication of the phrase "United States of America" was in an anonymous essay in The Virginia Gazette newspaper in Williamsburg, Virginia, on April 6, 1776. The second draft of the Articles of Confederation, prepared by John Dickinson and completed by June 17, 1776, at the latest, declared "The name of this Confederation shall be the'United States of America'".
The final version of the Articles sent to the states for ratification in late 1777 contains the sentence "The Stile of this Confederacy shall be'The United States of America'". In June 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote the phrase "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA" in all capitalized letters in the headline of his "original Rough draught" of the Declaration of Independence; this draft of the document did not surface unti
Pete Sampras
Pete Sampras is an American former tennis player, regarded by many as one of the greatest in the history of the sport. A right-handed player with a single-handed backhand, his precise and powerful serve earned him the nickname "Pistol Pete", his professional career began in 1988 and ended at the 2002 US Open, which he won, defeating rival Andre Agassi in the final. Sampras held the all-time record of seven Wimbledon Men's Singles titles with William Renshaw until 2017 when Roger Federer won his 8th title. Sampras won five US Open titles, a joint Open-era record shared by Roger Federer and Jimmy Connors, two Australian Open titles, his 14 Grand Slam titles were a record, surpassed when Federer won his 15th Grand Slam title at the 2009 Wimbledon Championships and also by Rafael Nadal at the 2017 French Open and Novak Djokovic at the 2019 Australian Open. Sampras won 64 singles titles, he first reached world No. 1 in 1993, held that position for a total of 286 weeks, including a record six consecutive year-end No. 1 rankings from 1993 to 1998.
In 2007, he was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame. Sampras was born in Washington, D. C. the third child of Soterios "Sammy" and Georgia Sampras. His mother emigrated from Sparta and his father was born in the United States to a Greek father, Costas "Gus" Sampras and a Jewish mother, Sarah Steinberg, he attended regular services of the Greek Orthodox Church on Sundays. At the age of 3, he discovered a tennis racket in the basement of his home and spent hours hitting balls against the wall. In 1978, the Sampras family moved to Palos Verdes and the warmer climate there allowed the seven-year-old Sampras to play tennis throughout more of the year. From early on, his great idol was Rod Laver, at the age of 11, Sampras met and played tennis with the legend; the Sampras family joined the Jack Kramer Club, it was here that Sampras's talent became apparent. As a teenager, Sampras trained with tennis coach Robert Lansdorp; the forehand he learned from Lansdorp was the same forehand. The key was an emphasis on driving through the ball and not hitting extreme topspin.
He was spotted by Dr. Peter Fischer, a pediatrician and tennis enthusiast, who coached Sampras until 1989. Fischer was responsible for converting Sampras's double-handed backhand to single-hand with the goal of being better prepared to win Wimbledon. Sampras turned professional in 1988, at the age of 16, finished the year ranked world No. 97 after starting the year at No. 893. His first professional match was a loss to Sammy Giammalva, Jr. at the February Ebel U. S. Pro Indoor in Philadelphia. However, just one week at the Lipton International Players Championships in Miami, Sampras defeated two top-40 players, before losing to No. 18 Emilio Sánchez. Sampras did not defeat another top-40 player for six months, at which point he defeated No. 39 Michiel Schapers at a US Open warm-up tournament in Rye Brook, New York. In his first Grand Slam singles match, Sampras lost to No. 69 Jaime Yzaga of Peru in the first round of the US Open. Sampras did not advance past the quarterfinals in his next three tournaments, although he did record wins over No. 79 Jim Courier in their first career match-up, along with defeating No. 8 Tim Mayotte.
The following year, Sampras improved his ranking to a year-ending No. 81. He lost in the first round of the 1989 Australian Open to Christian Saceanu and, at that year's French Open, won a Grand Slam singles match for the first time in his career. A few weeks Sampras lost in the first round of Wimbledon to Todd Woodbridge. At the US Open, Sampras defeated defending champion and fifth-seeded Mats Wilander in the second round before losing to No. 13 Jay Berger in the fourth round. To end the year, Sampras lost in the first round in four consecutive tournaments, he lost to Wilander in the quarterfinals of the tournament in Sydney. At the Australian Open, Sampras upset twelfth-ranked Mayotte in the first round before losing to thirteenth-ranked Yannick Noah in the fourth round in four sets, his first professional singles title came in February at the Ebel U. S. Pro Indoor in Philadelphia, where he defeated sixth-ranked Andre Agassi, eighth-ranked Mayotte, eighteenth-ranked Andrés Gómez in the final.
This title elevated his ranking into the top 20 for the first time. Sampras finished 1990 at No. 5, having started the year ranked No. 61 just prior to the start of the Australian Open. Sampras did not play in the 1990 French Open and again lost in the first round of Wimbledon, this time to Christo van Rensburg. Sampras played seven consecutive weeks during the North American summer hard-court season, he defeated John McEnroe in the quarterfinals of the Canadian Open, but lost to Chang in the semifinals. He reached the semifinals of the tournament in Los Angeles, where he lost to No. 2 Stefan Edberg. He did not advance past the quarterfinals in his next three tournaments, losing to Chang, Richey Reneberg, Goran Ivanišević. In September, Sampras captured his first Grand Slam title, at the US Open. Along the way, he defeated sixth-ranked Thomas Muster in the fourth round and third-ranked Ivan Lendl in a five-set quarterfinal, breaking Lendl's streak of eight consecutive US Open finals, he defeated 20th-ranked McEnroe in a four-set semifinal to set up a final with fourth-ranked Agassi.
Sampras beat Agassi in straight sets to become the US Open's youngest-ever male singles champion at the age of 19 years and 28 days. He won the Grand Slam Cup to complete his year. In 1991, Sampras captured the first of his five career
