Quebec City Québec, is the capital city of the Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2016 the city had a population of 531,902, the metropolitan area had a population of 800,296, it is the seventh largest metropolitan area in Canada. The Algonquian people had named the area Kébec, an Algonquin word meaning "where the river narrows", because the Saint Lawrence River narrows proximate to the promontory of Quebec and its Cape Diamant. Explorer Samuel de Champlain founded a French settlement here in 1608, adopted the Algonquin name. Quebec City is one of the oldest European cities in North America; the ramparts surrounding Old Quebec are the only fortified city walls remaining in the Americas north of Mexico. This area was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1985 as the "Historic District of Old Québec"; the city's landmarks include the Château Frontenac hotel that dominates the skyline and the Citadelle of Quebec, an intact fortress that forms the centrepiece of the ramparts surrounding the old city and includes a secondary royal residence.

The National Assembly of Quebec, the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, the Musée de la civilisation are found within or near Vieux-Québec. According to the Government of Canada, the Government of Quebec, the Geographical Names Board of Canada, the names of Canadian cities and towns have only one official form. Thus, Québec is spelled with an accented é in both Canadian English and French. In English, the city and the province are distinguished by the fact that the province does not have an accented é and the city does. Informally, the accent is omitted in common usage, so the unofficial form "Quebec City" is used to distinguish the city from the province. In French, the names of provinces are gendered nouns and the names of cities are not, so the city and the province are distinguished by the presence or absence of a definite article in front of the name. For example, the concept of "in Quebec" is expressed as "à Québec" for the city and "au Québec" for the province. Quebec City is one of the oldest European settlements in North America and the only fortified city north of Mexico whose walls still exist.

While many of the major cities in Latin America date from the 16th century, among cities in Canada and the U. S. few were created earlier than Quebec City. It is home to the earliest known French settlement in North America, Fort Charlesbourg-Royal, established in 1541 by explorer Jacques Cartier with some 400 persons but abandoned less than a year due to the hostility of the natives and the harsh winter; the fort was in the suburban former town of Cap-Rouge. Quebec was founded by Samuel de Champlain, a French explorer and diplomat, on 3 July 1608, at the site of a long abandoned St. Lawrence Iroquoian settlement called Stadacona. Champlain called "The Father of New France", served as its administrator for the rest of his life; the name "Canada" refers to this settlement. Although the Acadian settlement at Port-Royal was established three years earlier, Quebec came to be known as the cradle of North America's Francophone population; the place seemed favourable to the establishment of a permanent colony.

The population of the settlement remained small for decades. In 1629 it was captured by English privateers, led during the Anglo-French War. Samuel de Champlain argued that the English seizing of the lands was illegal as the war had ended, worked to have the lands returned to France; as part of the ongoing negotiations of their exit from the Anglo-French War, in 1632 the English king Charles agreed to return the lands in exchange for Louis XIII paying his wife's dowry. These terms were signed into law with the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye; the lands in Quebec and Acadia were returned to the French Company of One Hundred Associates. In 1665, there were 550 people in 70 houses living in the city. One-quarter of the people were members of religious orders: secular priests, Ursulines nuns and the order running the local hospital, Hotel-Dieu. Quebec was the headquarters of many raids against New England during the four French and Indian Wars. In 1690 the city was attacked by the English, but was defended.

In the last of the conflicts, the French and Indian War, Quebec was captured by the British in 1759 and held until the end of the war in 1763. In that time many battles and sieges took place: the Battle of a French victory. A French counter attack saw a French victory at the Battle of Sainte-Foy but the subsequent second Siege of Quebec the following month however saw a final British victory. France ceded New France, including the city, to Britain in 1763. At the end of French rule in 1763, villages and pastures surrounded the town of 8,000 inhabitants; the town distinguished itself by its monumental architecture and affluent homes of masonry and shacks in the suburbs of Saint-Jean and Saint-Roch. Despite its urbanity and its status as capital, Quebec City remained a small colonial city with close ties to its rural surroundings. Nearby inhabitants traded their farm surpluses and firewood

WCJ was a radio station, located in New Haven, licensed to the A. C. Gilbert Company from September 29, 1921 to December 1, 1922. Although short-lived, it was the first broadcasting station licensed in the state of Connecticut, one of the first in the United States. Founded in 1909, the A. C. Gilbert Company was a prominent toy manufacturer with a target audience consisting of young boys, best known for its Erector Set construction sets. After War World One, the company expanded into selling amateur radio equipment, offering "Superdyne" regenerative vacuum tube receivers designed by the C. D. Tuska Company. In conjunction with the radio receiver sales, on September 29, 1921 the company was issued a Limited Commercial radio license with the randomly assigned call letters of WCJ, operating on a wavelength of 360 meters. There were no formal regulations in the United States about stations making broadcasts intended for the general public until December 1, 1921, when the Department of Commerce began requiring Limit Commercial licenses operating on wavelengths of 360 or 485 meters, which WCJ held.

This station was located at the A. C. Gilbert factory at 493 Blatchley Avenue in New Haven. A 125-foot tower was constructed in back of the factory, an antenna and counterpoise were strung, over the building, from this tower to a pre-existing smokestack; the company inaugurated a limited series of broadcasts, both in Morse code and full audio, some by company employees drafted by the company president, Alfred Carlton Gilbert, to provide entertainment. WCJ's most prominent use occurred in the summer of 1922, when the company outfitted a railroad car with samples from its catalog, which company publicity described as "The most far-reaching and effective undertaking in co-operative merchandising between manufacturers and dealers conceived". Included was a demonstration radio receiver used for reception of twice-daily broadcasts made by WCJ.. The company soon faced difficulty related to its radio receiver sales, when the Radio Corporation of America complained that the patent rights held by Tuska were not transferable to additional companies like A. C.

Gilbert. To avoid a lawsuit, the company ended the offending receiver sales, WCJ ceased operations, was formally deleted on December 1, 1922. Although WCJ was no longer in operation, the radio tower was left standing, large letters spelling "ERECTOR" were installed vertically down the structure; this tower remained standing until January 9, 1978, when it was knocked down by a wind storm

Socarrat refers to fired clay tiles covered with a white base and painted in red and black. These were placed between joists in buildings' ceilings and eaves, their origin is medieval but subsequent production of these objects is known in Valencia. There are other words to name objects with similar function such as rajola, maó prim, atovó or cairó; the first register about its existence takes us back to 1604, when D. Feliciano de Figueroa, Bishop of Segorbe, refers to a group of roof and wall tiles written and coloured with koranic transcripts. Traditionally, they’re said to come from Paterna but the presence of these and other similar objects has been documented too in Manises and in some other places in Valencia and Catalonia. Socarrat can refer to the scorched rice crust that forms on the bottom of the pan when cooking paella. Socarrats were manufactured in two basic sizes: the smaller with 30 x 15 x 3 cm and the larger with 40 x 30 x 3 cm; the first one could be used in buildings in two main ways: decorating eaves either leaning on walls or on joists.

They could be used in ornamental friezes, in balconies and staircases. The largest tiles filled the space between joists on interior ceilings, with both structural and decorative functions, supporting pavements or roofs; the smaller size could carry out the same function. Socarrats were reused to build new walls and levelling out pavements. There's a wide debate. Being objects with ceramic base, controversy starts when one considers the stages that occur after drying the moulded ceramic paste. González Martí and Blat Monsó are the most representative authors on this subject. According to González Martí, the dry tile should be covered with a kaolin based earth and painted with iron and manganese oxides, it should be fired and the result should be a matte decoration. The existence of a firing process and the nature of pigments were not always clear. Before González Martí, some authors have referred the lime used to decorate socarrats could not have been fired after application on the tile. Afterwards, Blat Monsó and others have reinforced this statement.

There are three basic types of representations in socarrats: religious and social ones. The first one includes crosses and inscriptions, such as the koranic verses written on the socarrats of the Xara mosque in Valdigna. Fatima’s hands or Hamsa, towers and chimeric figures such as Butoni, a monster in the valencian imaginary are part of the second type of representations; the use of heraldic symbols and decorated elements made visible in public spaces and the representation of courtesan and satiric scenes fulfilled the third one. Socarrats were used to do public announcements, such as the edict for recruit of soldiers of the Duke of Segorbe, in 1513. Coll Conesa, J. "La cerámica de los siglos XVI y XVII". Historia de la Cerámica Valenciana. AVEC, Associación Valenciana de Cerámica. Retrieved 2008-08-31