1.
Bradford
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Bradford /ˈbrædfərd/ is in the Metropolitan Borough of the City of Bradford in West Yorkshire, England, in the foothills of the Pennines 8.6 miles west of Leeds, and 16 miles northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897. Following local government reform in 1974, city status was bestowed upon the metropolitan borough. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Bradford rose to prominence during the 19th century as a centre of textile manufacture. It was a boomtown of the Industrial Revolution, and amongst the earliest industrialised settlements, the textile sector in Bradford fell into decline from the mid-20th century. However, Bradford has faced challenges to the rest of the post-industrial area of Northern England, including deindustrialisation, social unrest. It was recorded as Bradeford in 1086, after an uprising in 1070, during William the Conquerors Harrying of the North, the manor of Bradford was laid waste and is described as such in the Domesday Book of 1086. It then became part of the Honour of Pontefract given to Ilbert de Lacy for service to the Conqueror, there is evidence of a castle in the time of the Lacys. The manor then passed to the Earl of Lincoln, John of Gaunt, The Crown and, ultimately, by the middle ages Bradford, had become a small town centred on Kirkgate, Westgate and Ivegate. In 1316 there is mention of a mill, a soke mill where all the manor corn was milled. During the Wars of the Roses the inhabitants sided with House of Lancaster, Edward IV granted the right to hold two annual fairs and from this time the town began to prosper. In the reign of Henry VIII Bradford exceeded Leeds as a manufacturing centre, Bradford grew slowly over the next two-hundred years as the woollen trade gained in prominence. During the Civil War the town was garrisoned for the Parliamentarians, Sir Thomas Fairfax took the command of the garrison and marched to meet the Duke of Newcastle but was defeated. The Parliamentarians retreated to Bradford and the Royalists set up headquarters at Bolling Hall from where the town was besieged leading to its surrender, the Civil War caused a decline in industry but after the accession of William and Mary in 1689 prosperity began to return. The launch of manufacturing in the early 18th century marked the start of the development while new canal. In 1801, Bradford was a market town of 6,393 people. Bradford was thus not much bigger than nearby Keighley and was smaller than Halifax. This small town acted as a hub for three nearby townships – Manningham, Bowling and Great and Little Horton, which were separated from the town by countryside
2.
British people
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British people, or Britons, are the citizens of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown dependencies, and their descendants. British nationality law governs modern British citizenship and nationality, which can be acquired, for instance, although early assertions of being British date from the Late Middle Ages, the creation of the united Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707 triggered a sense of British national identity. The notion of Britishness was forged during the Napoleonic Wars between Britain and the First French Empire, and developed further during the Victorian era, because of longstanding ethno-sectarian divisions, British identity in Northern Ireland is controversial, but it is held with strong conviction by unionists. Modern Britons are descended mainly from the ethnic groups that settled in the British Isles in and before the 11th century, Prehistoric, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Norse. The British are a diverse, multi-national and multicultural society, with regional accents, expressions. Although none of his own writings remain, writers during the time of the Roman Empire made much reference to them, the group included Ireland, which was referred to as Ierne inhabited by the different race of Hiberni, and Britain as insula Albionum, island of the Albions. The term Pritani may have reached Pytheas from the Gauls, who used it as their term for the inhabitants of the islands. Greek and Roman writers, in the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD, name the inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland as the Priteni, the origin of the Latin word Britanni. It has been suggested that name derives from a Gaulish description translated as people of the forms. By 50 BC Greek geographers were using equivalents of Prettanikē as a name for the British Isles. However, the term Britannia persisted as the Latin name for the island, during the Middle Ages, and particularly in the Tudor period, the term British was used to refer to the Welsh people and Cornish people. At that time, it was the held belief that these were the remaining descendants of the ancient Britons. This notion was supported by such as the Historia Regum Britanniae. Wales and Cornwall, and north, i. e. Cumbria, Strathclyde and this legendary Celtic history of Great Britain is known as the Matter of Britain. The indigenous people of the British Isles have a combination of Celtic, Norse, Anglo-Saxon, oppenheimer continues that the majority of the people of the British Isles share genetic commonalities with the Basques, ranging from highs of 90% in Wales to lows of 66% in East Anglia. Oppenheimers opinion is that. by far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia, ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales. The English had been unified under a single state in 937 by King Athelstan of Wessex after the Battle of Brunanburh. However, historian Simon Schama suggested that it was Edward I of England who was responsible for provoking the peoples of Britain into an awareness of their nationhood in the 13th century
3.
Academy Awards
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The various category winners are awarded a copy of a golden statuette, officially called the Academy Award of Merit, which has become commonly known by its nickname Oscar. The awards, first presented in 1929 at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, are overseen by AMPAS, the awards ceremony was first broadcast on radio in 1930 and televised for the first time in 1953. It is now live in more than 200 countries and can be streamed live online. The Academy Awards ceremony is the oldest worldwide entertainment awards ceremony and its equivalents – the Emmy Awards for television, the Tony Awards for theater, and the Grammy Awards for music and recording – are modeled after the Academy Awards. The 89th Academy Awards ceremony, honoring the best films of 2016, were held on February 26,2017, at the Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles, the ceremony was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and was broadcast on ABC. A total of 3,048 Oscars have been awarded from the inception of the award through the 88th, the first Academy Awards presentation was held on May 16,1929, at a private dinner function at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel with an audience of about 270 people. The post-awards party was held at the Mayfair Hotel, the cost of guest tickets for that nights ceremony was $5. Fifteen statuettes were awarded, honoring artists, directors and other participants in the industry of the time. The ceremony ran for 15 minutes, winners were announced to media three months earlier, however, that was changed for the second ceremony in 1930. Since then, for the rest of the first decade, the results were given to newspapers for publication at 11,00 pm on the night of the awards. The first Best Actor awarded was Emil Jannings, for his performances in The Last Command and he had to return to Europe before the ceremony, so the Academy agreed to give him the prize earlier, this made him the first Academy Award winner in history. With the fourth ceremony, however, the system changed, for the first six ceremonies, the eligibility period spanned two calendar years. At the 29th ceremony, held on March 27,1957, until then, foreign-language films had been honored with the Special Achievement Award. The 74th Academy Awards, held in 2002, presented the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, since 1973, all Academy Awards ceremonies always end with the Academy Award for Best Picture. The Academy also awards Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, see also § Awards of Merit categories The best known award is the Academy Award of Merit, more popularly known as the Oscar statuette. The five spokes represent the branches of the Academy, Actors, Writers, Directors, Producers. The model for the statuette is said to be Mexican actor Emilio El Indio Fernández, sculptor George Stanley sculpted Cedric Gibbons design. The statuettes presented at the ceremonies were gold-plated solid bronze
4.
Pub
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A pub, or public house, is an establishment licensed to sell alcoholic drinks, which traditionally include beer, ale and cider. It is a relaxed, social drinking establishment and a prominent part of British, Irish, New Zealand, Canadian, in many places, especially in villages, a pub is the focal point of the community. In his 17th century diary Samuel Pepys described the pub as the heart of England, Pubs can be traced back to Roman taverns, through the Anglo-Saxon alehouse to the development of the tied house system in the 19th century. In 1393, King Richard II of England introduced legislation that pubs had to display a sign outdoors to make them easily visible for passing ale tasters who would assess the quality of ale sold, most pubs focus on offering beers, ales and similar drinks. As well, pubs often sell wines, spirits, and soft drinks, meals, the owner, tenant or manager is known as the pub landlord or publican. The pub quiz was established in the UK in the 1970s and these alehouses quickly evolved into meeting houses for the folk to socially congregate, gossip and arrange mutual help within their communities. Herein lies the origin of the public house, or Pub as it is colloquially called in England. They rapidly spread across the Kingdom, becoming so commonplace that in 965 King Edgar decreed that there should be no more than one alehouse per village. A traveller in the early Middle Ages could obtain overnight accommodation in monasteries, the Hostellers of London were granted guild status in 1446 and in 1514 the guild became the Worshipful Company of Innholders. A survey in 1577 of drinking establishment in England and Wales for taxation purposes recorded 14,202 alehouses,1,631 inns, Inns are buildings where travellers can seek lodging and, usually, food and drink. They are typically located in the country or along a highway, in Europe, they possibly first sprang up when the Romans built a system of roads two millennia ago. Some inns in Europe are several centuries old, in addition to providing for the needs of travellers, inns traditionally acted as community gathering places. In Europe, it is the provision of accommodation, if anything, the latter tend to provide alcohol, but less commonly accommodation. Famous London inns include The George, Southwark and The Tabard, there is however no longer a formal distinction between an inn and other kinds of establishment. In North America, the aspect of the word inn lives on in hotel brand names like Holiday Inn. The Inns of Court and Inns of Chancery in London started as ordinary inns where barristers met to do business, traditional English ale was made solely from fermented malt. The practice of adding hops to produce beer was introduced from the Netherlands in the early 15th century, alehouses would each brew their own distinctive ale, but independent breweries began to appear in the late 17th century. By the end of the century almost all beer was brewed by commercial breweries, the 18th century saw a huge growth in the number of drinking establishments, primarily due to the introduction of gin
5.
Laurence Olivier
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Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM, was an English actor who, along with his contemporaries Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud, dominated the British stage of the mid-20th century. He also worked in films throughout his career, playing more than fifty cinema roles, late in his career, he had considerable success in television roles. His family had no connections, but Oliviers father, a clergyman. After attending a school in London, Olivier learned his craft in a succession of acting jobs during the late 1920s. In 1930 he had his first important West End success in Noël Cowards Private Lives, in 1935 he played in a celebrated production of Romeo and Juliet alongside Gielgud and Peggy Ashcroft, and by the end of the decade he was an established star. In the 1940s, together with Richardson and John Burrell, Olivier was the co-director of the Old Vic, there his most celebrated roles included Shakespeares Richard III and Sophocless Oedipus. From 1963 to 1973 he was the director of Britains National Theatre. His own parts there included the role in Othello and Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. Among Oliviers films are Wuthering Heights, Rebecca, and a trilogy of Shakespeare films as actor-director, Henry V, Hamlet and his later films included Sleuth, Marathon Man, and The Boys from Brazil. His television appearances included an adaptation of The Moon and Sixpence, Long Days Journey into Night, Love Among the Ruins, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Brideshead Revisited, Oliviers honours included a knighthood, a life peerage and the Order of Merit. For his on-screen work he received four Academy Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, five Emmy Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. The National Theatres largest auditorium is named in his honour, and he is commemorated in the Laurence Olivier Awards, given annually by the Society of London Theatre. He was married three times, to the actresses Jill Esmond from 1930 to 1940, Vivien Leigh from 1940 to 1960, Olivier was born in Dorking, Surrey, the youngest of the three children of the Revd Gerard Kerr Olivier and his wife Agnes Louise, née Crookenden. Their elder children were Sybille and Gerard Dacres Dickie and his great-great-grandfather was of French Huguenot descent, and Olivier came from a long line of Protestant clergymen. Gerard Olivier had begun a career as a schoolmaster, but in his thirties he discovered a strong religious vocation and was ordained as a priest of the Church of England and he practised extremely high church, ritualist Anglicanism and liked to be addressed as Father Olivier. This made him unacceptable to most Anglican congregations, and the church posts he was offered were temporary. This meant a nomadic existence, and for Laurences first few years, in 1912, when Olivier was five, his father secured a permanent appointment as assistant priest at St Saviours, Pimlico. He held the post for six years, and a family life was at last possible
6.
Royal National Theatre
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The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdoms three most prominent publicly funded performing arts venues, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Royal Opera House. Internationally, it is known as the National Theatre of Great Britain, from its foundation in 1963 until 1976, the company was based at the Old Vic theatre in Waterloo. The current building is located next to the Thames in the South Bank area of central London, in addition to performances at the National Theatre building, the National Theatre company tours productions at theatres across the United Kingdom. Since 1988, the theatre has been permitted to call itself the Royal National Theatre, the theatre presents a varied programme, including Shakespeare and other international classic drama, and new plays by contemporary playwrights. Each auditorium in the theatre can run up to three shows in repertoire, thus widening the number of plays which can be put on during any one season. In June 2009, the theatre began National Theatre Live, a programme of simulcasts of live productions to cinemas, first in the United Kingdom, the programme began with a production of Phèdre, starring Helen Mirren, which was screened live in 70 cinemas across the UK. NT Live productions have since been broadcast to over 1,000 venues in 35 countries around the world, the NT had an annual turnover of approximately £87 million in 2012–13, of which earned income made up 80%. Support from Arts Council England provided 20% of income, and the remaining 7% came from a mixture of companies, individuals, trusts, in 1847, a critic using the pseudonym Dramaticus published a pamphlet describing the parlous state of British theatre. Production of serious plays was restricted to the patent theatres, at the same time, there was a burgeoning theatre sector featuring a diet of low melodrama and musical burlesque, but critics described British theatre as driven by commercialism and a star system. There was a demand to commemorate serious theatre, with the Shakespeare Committee purchasing the playwrights birthplace for the nation demonstrating a recognition of the importance of serious drama, the following year saw more pamphlets on a demand for a National Theatre from London publisher Effingham William Wilson. The situation continued, with a renewed call every decade for a National Theatre, attention was aroused in 1879 when the Comédie-Française took a residency at the Gaiety Theatre, described in The Times as representing the highest aristocracy of the theatre. This still left the capital without a national theatre and this work was interrupted by World War I. The play was part of the campaign to build a National Theatre. Still, the Government tried to apply unacceptable conditions to save money, attempting to force the amalgamation of the publicly supported companies. In July 1962, with agreements reached, a board was set up to supervise construction. The National Theatre Company opened on 22 October 1963 with Hamlet, the current building was designed by architects Sir Denys Lasdun and Peter Softley and structural engineers Flint & Neill and contains three stages, which opened individually between 1976 and 1977. The construction work was carried out by Sir Robert McAlpine, the Company was to remain at the Old Vic until 1977, when construction of the Olivier was complete. The National Theatre building houses three separate auditoria, additionally, a temporary structure was added in April 2013 and closed in May 2016
7.
Equus (play)
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Equus is a play by Peter Shaffer written in 1973, telling the story of a psychiatrist who attempts to treat a young man who has a pathological religious fascination with horses. Shaffer was inspired to write Equus when he heard of a crime involving a 17-year-old who blinded six horses in a town near Suffolk. He set out to construct a fictional account of what might have caused the incident, the original stage production ran at the National Theatre in London between 1973 and 1975, directed by John Dexter. Alec McCowen played Dysart, and Peter Firth played Alan Strang, later came the Broadway productions that starred Anthony Hopkins as Dysart and from the London production, Peter Firth as Alan. When Firth left for Broadway, Dai Bradley took over the role of Alan in the London production, tom Hulce replaced Firth during the Broadway run. The Broadway production ran for 1,209 performances, marian Seldes appeared in every single performance of the Broadway run, first in the role of Hesther and then as Dora. Shaffer also adapted his play for a 1977 film of the same name, numerous other issues inform the narrative. Most important are religious and ritual sacrifice themes, and the manner in which character Alan Strang constructs a personal theology involving the horses, Alan sees the horses as representative of God and confuses his adoration of his God with sexual attraction. Also important is Shaffers examination of the conflict between values and satisfaction and societal mores, expectations and institutions. In reference to the classical structure, themes and characterisation. Martin Dysart is a psychiatrist in a mental hospital and he begins with a monologue in which he outlines the case of 17-year-old Alan Strang, who blinded six horses. He also divulges his feeling that his occupation is not all that he wishes it to be and his feelings of dissatisfaction and he comments that Alan Strangs crime was extreme but adds that just such extremity is needed to break free from the chains of existence. A court magistrate, Hesther Saloman, visits Dysart, believing that he has the skills to help Alan come to terms with what he did. At the hospital, Dysart has a deal of difficulty making any kind of headway with Alan. Dysart reveals a dream he has had, in a Grecian/Homeric setting, Dysart slices open the viscera of hundreds of children, and pulls out their entrails. He becomes disgusted with what he is doing, but desiring to look professional to the other officials and he learns that, from an early age, Alan has been receiving conflicting viewpoints on religion from his parents. Alans mother, Dora, is a devout Christian who has read to him daily from the Bible and this practice has antagonized Alans father Frank, a non-believer. Slowly, Dysart makes contact with Alan by playing a game each of them asks a question
8.
Oscar Wilde
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Oscar Fingal OFlahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish playwright, novelist, essayist, and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he one of Londons most popular playwrights in the early 1890s. He is remembered for his epigrams, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, his plays, as well as the circumstances of his imprisonment, Wildes parents were successful Anglo-Irish, Dublin intellectuals. Their son became fluent in French and German early in life, at university, Wilde read Greats, he proved himself to be an outstanding classicist, first at Dublin, then at Oxford. He became known for his involvement in the philosophy of aestheticism. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles, known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversation, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day. The opportunity to construct aesthetic details precisely, and combine them with social themes. He wrote Salome in French in Paris but it was refused a licence for England due to the prohibition of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Unperturbed, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, at the height of his fame and success, while The Importance of Being Earnest, was still being performed in London, Wilde had the Marquess of Queensberry prosecuted for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wildes lover, Lord Alfred Douglas, the charge carried a penalty of up to two years in prison. The trial unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest, after two more trials he was convicted and imprisoned for two years hard labour. Upon his release he left immediately for France, never to return to Ireland or Britain, there he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life. He died destitute in Paris at the age of 46, Oscar Wilde was born at 21 Westland Row, Dublin, the second of three children born to Sir William Wilde and Jane Wilde, two years behind William. Wildes mother was of Italian descent, and under the pseudonym Speranza and she read the Young Irelanders poetry to Oscar and Willie, inculcating a love of these poets in her sons. Lady Wildes interest in the neo-classical revival showed in the paintings and busts of ancient Greece, William Wilde was Irelands leading oto-ophthalmologic surgeon and was knighted in 1864 for his services as medical adviser and assistant commissioner to the censuses of Ireland. He also wrote books about Irish archaeology and peasant folklore, a renowned philanthropist, his dispensary for the care of the citys poor at the rear of Trinity College, Dublin, was the forerunner of the Dublin Eye and Ear Hospital, now located at Adelaide Road. On his fathers side Wilde was descended from a Dutchman, Colonel de Wilde, on his mothers side Wildes ancestors included a bricklayer from County Durham who emigrated to Ireland sometime in the 1770s. Wilde was baptised as an infant in St, marks Church, Dublin, the local Church of Ireland church
9.
Jeremy Brett
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Jeremy Brett, was an English actor, probably best known for playing fictional detective Sherlock Holmes in four Granada TV series from 1984 to 1994 in all 41 episodes. His career spanned stage, to television and film, to Shakespeare. He is also remembered for playing the besotted Freddie Eynsford-Hill in the Warner Bros.1964 production of My Fair Lady, Jeremy Brett was born Peter Jeremy William Huggins at Berkswell Grange in Berkswell, West Midlands. His birthdate is given variously as either 3 November 1933, December 1933 or 1935, according to many sources and he was the son of Lieutenant Colonel Henry William Huggins, an Army officer, and Elizabeth Edith Cadbury Butler. He had three brothers, John, Patrick and Michael. The actor Martin Clunes is his nephew, educated at Eton College, he claimed to have been an academic disaster, attributing his learning difficulties to dyslexia. Although he eventually developed precisely honed diction, he was born with rhotacism and he underwent corrective surgery as a teenager and followed it with years of practising. Much later he claimed that he practised all of his speech exercises daily, however, while at Eton he excelled at singing and was a member of the college choir. In 1959, while Brett was playing Hamlet, his mother was killed in a car crash in the Welsh mountains and this had a tremendous effect on Brett. There was anger – it was interesting, and I think that came through. I felt cheated – I felt my mother had been cheated – the rage of that came through and he couldnt believe the circumstances and went on to say I was very rough on my mother, I think. I mean physically rough, in the play as he channelled his anger into his performance, Brett made his professional acting debut in rep at the Library Theatre in Manchester in 1954, and his London stage debut with the Old Vic company in Troilus and Cressida in 1956. He made his first appearance in a film with War and Peace. Also in 1956, he appeared on Broadway as the Duke of Aumerle in Richard II, in 1959, Brett had a singing role as the romantic lead of Archie Forsyth in the West End musical Marigold. Also in 1959, he played the part of Hamlet, however on reflection, in a BBC2 television documentary Playing the Dane, I had qualities, but Id much rather see other peoples. The respected theatre critic Harold Hobson wrote of Bretts portrayal that the bed was the centre of his performance. He played many roles on stage, including about a dozen Shakespearean parts at the Old Vic, in New York. From the early 1960s, Brett was often on British television and he starred in several serials, including as DArtagnan in an adaptation of The Three Musketeers
10.
John Gielgud
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Sir Arthur John Gielgud OM CH was an English actor and theatre director whose career spanned eight decades. With Ralph Richardson and Laurence Olivier, he was one of the trio of actors who dominated the British stage for much of the 20th century. A member of the Terry family theatrical dynasty, he gained his first paid acting work as a member of his cousin Phyllis Neilson-Terrys company in 1922. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art he worked in repertory theatre, during the 1930s Gielgud was a stage star in the West End and on Broadway, appearing in new works and classics. He began a career as a director, and set up his own company at the Queens Theatre. He was regarded by many as the finest Hamlet of his era, in the 1950s Gielgud feared that his career was threatened when he was convicted and fined for a homosexual offence, but his colleagues and the public supported him loyally. From the late 1960s he found new plays that suited him, by authors including Alan Bennett, David Storey, during the first half of his career, Gielgud did not take the cinema seriously. Though he made his first film in 1924, and had successes with The Good Companions and Julius Caesar, Gielgud appeared in more than sixty films between Becket, for which he received his first Academy Award nomination, and Elizabeth. As the acid-tongued Hobson in Arthur he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and his film work further earned him a Golden Globe Award and two BAFTAs. Although largely indifferent to awards, Gielgud had the distinction of winning an Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy. He was famous from the start of his career for his voice and he broadcast more than a hundred radio and television dramas, between 1929 and 1994, and made commercial recordings of many plays, including ten of Shakespeares. Among his honours, he was knighted in 1953 and the Gielgud Theatre was named after him, from 1977 to 1989, he was president of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Gielgud was born in South Kensington, London, the third of the four children and youngest of three sons of Frank Henry Gielgud and his second wife, Kate Terry-Gielgud, née Terry-Lewis. The two elder boys were Lewis, who became an official of the Red Cross and UNESCO. On his fathers side, Gielgud was of Lithuanian and Polish descent, the surname derives from Gelgaudiškis, a village in Lithuania. The Counts Gielgud had owned the Gielgudziszki Castle on the River Niemen, jan Gielgud took refuge in England with his family, one of his grandchildren was Frank Gielgud, whose maternal grandmother was a famous Polish actress, Aniela Aszpergerowa. Frank married into a family with wide theatrical connections, Frank had no theatrical ambitions and worked all his life as a stockbroker in the City of London. In 1912, aged eight, Gielgud went to Hillside preparatory school in Surrey as his brothers had done
11.
Royal Flying Corps
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The Royal Flying Corps was the air arm of the British Army before and during the First World War, until it merged with the Royal Naval Air Service on 1 April 1918 to form the Royal Air Force. During the early part of the war, the RFC supported the British Army by artillery co-operation, at the start of World War I the RFC, commanded by Brigadier-General Sir David Henderson, consisted of five squadrons – one observation balloon squadron and four aeroplane squadrons. These were first used for spotting on 13 September 1914. Aerial photography was attempted during 1914, but again only became effective the next year, by 1918, photographic images could be taken from 15,000 feet and were interpreted by over 3,000 personnel. By this time parachutes had been used by balloonists for three years, on 17 August 1917, South African General Jan Smuts presented a report to the War Council on the future of air power. On 1 April 1918, the RFC and the RNAS were amalgamated to form a new service, after starting in 1914 with some 2,073 personnel, by the start of 1919 the RAF had 4,000 combat aircraft and 114,000 personnel in some 150 squadrons. The recommendations of the committee were accepted and on 13 April 1912 King George V signed a royal warrant establishing the Royal Flying Corps, the Air Battalion of the Royal Engineers became the Military Wing of the Royal Flying Corps a month later on 13 May. The Flying Corps initial allowed strength was 133 officers, and by the end of year it had 12 manned balloons and 36 aeroplanes. The RFC originally came under the responsibility of Brigadier-General Henderson, the Director of Military Training, and had branches for the Army. Major Sykes commanded the Military Wing and Commander C R Samson commanded the Naval Wing, the RFCs motto was Per ardua ad astra. This remains the motto of the Royal Air Force and other Commonwealth air forces, the RFCs first fatal crash was on 5 July 1912 near Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain. Loraine and his observer, Staff Sergeant R. H. V, an order was issued after the crash stating Flying will continue this evening as usual, thus beginning a tradition. Four months later on 11 December 1912 Parke was killed when the Handley Page monoplane in which he was flying from Hendon to Oxford crashed. The Naval Wing, with pilots and aircraft than the Military Wing. In November 1914 the Royal Flying Corps, even taking the loss of the Naval Wing into account, had expanded sufficiently to warrant the creation of wings consisting of two or more squadrons and these wings were commanded by lieutenant-colonels. In October 1915 the Royal Flying Corps had undergone further expansion which justified the creation of brigades, further expansion led to the creation of divisions, with the Training Division being established in August 1917 and RFC Middle East, being raised to divisional status in December 1917. Finally, the air raids on London and the south-east of England led to the creation of the London Air Defence Area in August 1917 under the command of Ashmore who was promoted to major-general. Two of the first three RFC squadrons were formed from the Air Battalion of the Royal Engineers, No.1 Company becoming No.1 Squadron, RFC, a second heavier-than-air squadron, No.2 Squadron, RFC, was also formed on the same day
12.
Richard Burton
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Richard Burton, CBE was a Welsh actor who was noted for his mellifluous baritone voice. Burton established himself as a formidable Shakespearean actor in the 1950s and he was called the natural successor to Olivier by critic and dramaturge Kenneth Tynan. An alcoholic, Burtons failure to live up to those expectations disappointed critics and colleagues, Burton was nominated for an Academy Award seven times, but never won an Oscar. He was a recipient of BAFTAs, Golden Globes, and Tony Awards for Best Actor, Burton remains closely associated in the public consciousness with his second wife, actress Elizabeth Taylor. The couples turbulent relationship was rarely out of the news, Burton was born Richard Walter Jenkins, Jr. on 10 November 1925 in a house at 2 Dan-y-bont in Pontrhydyfen, Neath Port Talbot. He was the twelfth of thirteen born to Richard Walter Jenkins Sr. Jenkins Sr. called Daddy Ni by the family, was a miner, while his mother worked as a bartender at a pub called the Miners Arms. He remembered his mother to be a strong woman and a religious soul with fair hair. Richard was barely two years old when his mother died on 31 October, six days after the birth of Graham, Ediths death was a result of postpartum infections, Richard believed it occurred due to hygiene neglect. According to biographer Michael Munn, Edith was fastidiously clean, following Ediths death, Richards elder sister Cecilia, whom he affectionately addressed as Cis, and her husband Elfed James, also a miner, took him under their care. I was immensely proud of her and she felt all tragedies except her own. Daddy Ni would occasionally visit the homes of his daughters but was otherwise absent. Another important figure in Richards early life was Ifor, his brother,19 years his senior, a miner and rugby union player, Ifor ruled the household with the proverbial firm hand. He was also responsible for nurturing a passion for Rugby in young Richard, although Richard also played cricket, tennis, and table tennis, biographer Bragg notes rugby union football to be his greatest interest. On rugby, Richard said he would rather have played for Wales at Cardiff Arms Park than Hamlet at The Old Vic, the Welsh rugby union centre, Bleddyn Williams believed Richard had distinct possibilities as a player. From the age of five to eight, Richard was educated at the Eastern Primary School while he attended the Boys segment of the school from eight to twelve years old. He took an exam for admission into Port Talbot Secondary School in March 1937. Biographer Hollis Alpert notes that both Daddy Ni and Ifor considered Richards education to be of paramount importance and planned to send him to the University of Oxford, Richard became the first member of his family to go to secondary school
