1.
Rice Stadium (University of Utah)
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Robert Rice Stadium was an outdoor athletic stadium in Salt Lake City, Utah, located on the campus of the University of Utah. Originally opened in 1927 as Ute Stadium, it was the home of the Utah Utes football team. Renamed for Robert L. Rice in 1972, it was almost completely demolished after the 1997 season to make way for the Utes current home, Rice–Eccles Stadium, which occupies the same physical footprint. After a record crowd came to the Utes previous home, Cummings Field, to see Utah play Utah State on Thanksgiving Day 1926, a drive began for a larger and more modern stadium. While the state house unanimously approved a loan from the state in order to build a new stadium, to get around the problem, the U of U formed a stadium trust that issued tax-free bonds for the new stadium. The stadium was funded in part by selling tickets to two home games for the next 10 years. The stadium, originally named Ute Stadium, opened in 1927 with a capacity of 20,000. The first college game was a 40–6 Ute victory over Colorado Mines on October 1. It was dedicated three weeks later on October 22 with a 20–13 victory over Colorado, on hand was Crown Prince Gustaf Adolf of Sweden. Originally, the stadium was built of timber and concrete, with earth-fill, for 20 years, a giant pile of dirt stood in the north end zone. In 1947,10,000 seats were added in the north end, the old grass surface was also replaced with AstroTurf. The dressing rooms were remodeled, and the running track was removed. The renovated stadium was dedicated in Rices honor with the start of the 1972 season, in 1982, the field was lowered 9.5 feet, and new seats were built along the sidelines and on the south end. After the 1994 season, the turf was replaced with SportGrass, for many years, the stadium also doubled as an amphitheater during the summer. Although it was noted as one of the more intimate venues in college football, very few Division I-A stadiums remained by then that used timber as a major part of its construction. Several pro football games were played at Ute Stadium. August 23,1947 Brooklyn Dodgers 20-17 Chicago Rockets September 8,1951 Chicago Cardinals 36-21 Los Angeles Rams September 19,1959 New York Giants 17-13 San Francisco 49ers August 16,1963 St. With this in mind, the department decided to completely overhaul the facility to bring it up to modern standards
2.
Rice Track/Soccer Stadium
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Rice Track/Soccer Stadium is a stadium in Houston, Texas. It is primarily used for track and field and soccer for the Rice University Owls and it sits on the location of Rice Field, Rices old football stadium that was used prior to the opening of Rice Stadium in 1950. The venue held less than 37,000 people for football, today, it holds approximately 5,000 people. Part of the grandstand from the side of the old football stadium is used as the current grandstand. Today, there are about 100 permanent seats on the stone terracing, the soccer field was installed in 2000-2001 after Rice added womens soccer as a varsity sport. In October 2002, the stadium hosted a WUSA exhibition match between the Washington Freedom and the Atlanta Beat, the event set the current stadium record with more than 5,000 tickets sold. The stadium hosted another WUSA exhibition in 2003 and has hosted two conference tournaments, the Western Athletic Conference Tournament in 2002 and the Conference USA Tournament in 2005. The WAC Outdoor Track & Field Championships were held there in 2002, following Rices move to Conference USA in 2005, the C-USA Outdoor Track & Field Championships were hosted at the facility in 2007
3.
Rice Stadium (Rice University)
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Rice Stadium is an American football stadium located on the Rice University campus in Houston, Texas. It has been the home of the Rice Owls football team since its completion in 1950, architecturally, Rice Stadium is an example of modern architecture, with simple lines and an unadorned, functional design. The lower seating bowl is located below the ground level. Built solely for football, the stadium has excellent sightlines from almost every seat, to achieve this, the running track was eliminated so that spectators were closer to the action and each side of the upper decks was brought in at a concave angle to provide better sightlines. It is still recognized in many circles as the best stadium in Texas for watching a football game, entrances and aisles were strategically placed so that the entire stadium could be emptied of spectators in nine minutes. In 2006, Rice University upgraded the facility by switching from AstroTurf to FieldTurf, seating in the upper deck is in poor condition, which led the university to move home games for which large crowds were expected to nearby NRG Stadium. High school football games, especially neutral-site playoff games, are played at Rice Stadium. It can also be used as a concert venue, Rice Stadium replaced Rice Field, which had a total capacity of less than 37,000, in 1950. The new stadium was subsidized by the City of Houston, and it was designed by Hermon Lloyd & W. B. Morgan and Milton McGinty and built by Brown and Root. In addition to Rice, the University of Houston football team played at Rice Stadium from 1951 to 1965, the Houston Oilers also played in the stadium from 1965 to 1967. In 1974, Rice Stadium hosted Super Bowl VIII, in which the Miami Dolphins beat the Minnesota Vikings 24–7. It was the first Super Bowl played in Houston, and it would be 30 years later that the Super Bowl would return to Houston, on July 2,1988, Rice Stadium hosted a stop on the Monsters of Rock tour. The tour was headlined by Van Halen and also featured Metallica, Scorpions, Dokken and this was also the Texas World Music Festival. In the speech, he used a reference to Rice University football to help frame his rhetoric, But why, some say, why choose this as our goal. And they may ask, why climb the highest mountain. Why,35 years ago, fly the Atlantic and we choose to go to the moon. Kennedys comments implied Rice had a history of losing to Texas, however, as originally built, Rice Stadium seated 70,000, the second-largest stadium in the Southwest Conference. Rice Stadium was built before professional football came to Houston, and 70,000 fans might be expected to attend a football game there
4.
Houston
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Houston is the most populous city in the state of Texas and the fourth-most populous city in the United States. With a census-estimated 2014 population of 2.239 million within an area of 667 square miles, it also is the largest city in the southern United States and the seat of Harris County. Located in Southeast Texas near the Gulf of Mexico, it is the city of Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land. Houston was founded on August 28,1836, near the banks of Buffalo Bayou and incorporated as a city on June 5,1837. The city was named after former General Sam Houston, who was president of the Republic of Texas and had commanded, the burgeoning port and railroad industry, combined with oil discovery in 1901, has induced continual surges in the citys population. Houstons economy has an industrial base in energy, manufacturing, aeronautics. Leading in health care sectors and building equipment, Houston has more Fortune 500 headquarters within its city limits than any city except for New York City. The Port of Houston ranks first in the United States in international waterborne tonnage handled, the city has a population from various ethnic and religious backgrounds and a large and growing international community. Houston is the most diverse city in Texas and has described as the most diverse in the United States. It is home to cultural institutions and exhibits, which attract more than 7 million visitors a year to the Museum District. Houston has a visual and performing arts scene in the Theater District. In August 1836, two real estate entrepreneurs from New York, Augustus Chapman Allen and John Kirby Allen, purchased 6,642 acres of land along Buffalo Bayou with the intent of founding a city. The Allen brothers decided to name the city after Sam Houston, the general at the Battle of San Jacinto. The great majority of slaves in Texas came with their owners from the slave states. Sizable numbers, however, came through the slave trade. New Orleans was the center of trade in the Deep South. Thousands of enslaved African Americans lived near the city before the Civil War, many of them near the city worked on sugar and cotton plantations, while most of those in the city limits had domestic and artisan jobs. Houston was granted incorporation on June 5,1837, with James S. Holman becoming its first mayor, in the same year, Houston became the county seat of Harrisburg County and the temporary capital of the Republic of Texas
5.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
6.
Rice University
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William Marsh Rice University, commonly referred to as Rice University or Rice, is a private research university located on a 295-acre campus in Houston, Texas, United States. The university is situated near the Houston Museum District and is adjacent to the Texas Medical Center, Rice is generally considered the top university and the most selective institute of higher education in the state of Texas. Opened in 1912 after the murder of its namesake William Marsh Rice, Rice is now a university with an undergraduate focus. Its emphasis on education is demonstrated by a student body and 6,1 student-faculty ratio. The university has a high level of research activity for its size. Rice is noted for its science programs in the fields of artificial heart research, structural chemical analysis, signal processing, space science. It was ranked first in the world in materials science research by the Times Higher Education in 2010, Rice is a member of the Association of American Universities. Graduate programs are offered through the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business, School of Architecture, Shepherd School of Music, Rice students are bound by the strict Honor Code, which is enforced by a student-run Honor Council. Rice competes in 14 NCAA Division I varsity sports and is a part of Conference USA, intramural and club sports are offered in a wide variety of activities such as jiu jitsu, water polo, and crew. In 1891, Rice decided to charter a free-tuition educational institute in Houston, bearing his name, to be created upon his death, Rices will specified the institution was to be a competitive institution of the highest grade and that only white students would be permitted to attend. On the morning of September 23,1900, Rice, age 84, was dead by his valet. Shortly thereafter, a large check made out to Rices New York City lawyer. The lawyer, Albert T. Patrick, then announced that Rice had changed his will to leave the bulk of his fortune to Patrick, rather than to the creation of Rices educational institute. Rices friend and personal lawyer in Houston, James A. Baker, Jones was not prosecuted since he cooperated with the district attorney, and testified against Patrick. Patrick was found guilty of conspiring to steal Rices fortune and convicted of murder in 1901, Baker helped Rices estate direct the fortune, worth $4.6 million in 1904, towards the founding of what was to be called the Rice Institute. The board took control of the assets on April 29 of that year and he came recommended by Princetons president, Woodrow Wilson. In 1908, Lovett accepted the challenge, and was inaugurated as the Institutes first president on October 12,1912. Lovett undertook extensive research before formalizing plans for the new Institute, Lovett called for the establishment of a university of the highest grade, an institution of liberal and technical learning devoted quite as much to investigation as to instruction
7.
Seating capacity
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Seating capacity is the number of people who can be seated in a specific space, in terms of both the physical space available, and limitations set by law. Seating capacity can be used in the description of anything ranging from an automobile that seats two to a stadium that seats hundreds of thousands of people. The International Fire Code, portions of which have adopted by many jurisdictions, is directed more towards the use of a facility than the construction. It specifies, For areas having fixed seating without dividing arms and it also requires that every public venue submit a detailed site plan to the local fire code official, including details of the means of egress, seating capacity, arrangement of the seating. Once safety considerations have been satisfied, determinations of seating capacity turn on the size of the venue. For sports venues, the decision on maximum seating capacity is determined by several factors, chief among these are the primary sports program and the size of the market area. Seating capacity of venues also plays a role in what media they are able to provide, in contracting to permit performers to use a theatre or other performing space, the seating capacity of the performance facility must be disclosed. Seating capacity may influence the kind of contract to be used, the seating capacity must also be disclosed to the copyright owner in seeking a license for the copyrighted work to be performed in that venue. Venues that may be leased for private functions such as ballrooms and auditoriums generally advertise their seating capacity, seating capacity is also an important consideration in the construction and use of sports venues such as stadiums and arenas. The seating capacity for restaurants is reported as covers, a restaurant that can seat 99 is said to have 99 covers, seating capacity differs from total capacity, which describes the total number of people who can fit in a venue or in a vehicle either sitting or standing. Use of the term public capacity indicates that a venue is allowed to more people than it can actually seat. Again, the total number of people can refer to either the physical space available or limitations set by law
8.
AstroTurf
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AstroTurf is a brand of artificial turf playing surface. The original AstroTurf product was a synthetic turf. The prime reason to incorporate AstroTurf on game fields was to avoid the cost of laying natural turf, the name AstroTurf has evolved into a generic trademark and is sometimes used to refer to all brands of artificial turf. The original AstroTurf brand product was co-invented in 1965 by Donald L. Elbert, James M. Faria and it was patented in 1965 and originally sold under the name ChemGrass. It was re-branded as AstroTurf by an employee named John A. Wortmann after its first well-publicized use at the Houston Astrodome stadium in 1966. Early iterations of the short pile turf swept the major stadia, concerns over directionality and traction led Monsantos R&D department to implement a texturized nylon system. By imparting a crimped texture to the nylon after it was extruded, in 1987, Monsanto consolidated its AstroTurf management, marketing, and technical activities in Dalton, Georgia, as AstroTurf Industries, Inc. In 1988, Balsam AG purchased all the stock of AstroTurf Industries. In 1994, Southwest Recreational Industries, Inc. acquired the AstroTurf brand, in 1996, SRI was acquired by American Sports Products Group Inc. While AstroTurf was the leader throughout the late 20th century. FieldTurf, AstroTurfs chief competitor in the early 2000s and today and this third generation turf, as it became known, changed the landscape of the marketplace. Although SRI successfully marketed AstroPlay, a third generation turf product, increased competition, despite their legal victory, increased competition took its toll. Out of the proceedings, Textile Management Associates, Inc. of Dalton, Georgia, acquired the AstroTurf brand. TMA began marketing the AstroTurf brand under the company AstroTurf, LLC, in 2006, General Sports Venue became TMAs marketing partner for the AstroTurf brand for the American market. AstroTurf, LLC handled the marketing of AstroTurf in the rest of the world, in 2009, TMA acquired GSV in order to enter the marketplace as a direct seller. AstroTurf, LLC focused its efforts on research and development, which has promoted rapid growth, AstroTurf introduced new product features and installation methods, including AstroFlect and field prefabrication. AstroTurf also introduced a product called RootZone consisting of crimped fibers designed to encapsulate infill and this product has been adopted by many professional organizations and colleges in the United States. In 2016, SportGroup Holding announced that it would purchase AstroTurf,1964 The Moses Brown School in Providence, Rhode Island, installs ChemGrass
9.
FieldTurf
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FieldTurf is a brand of artificial turf playing surface. It is manufactured and installed by FieldTurf Tarkett, a division of French company Tarkett Inc. headquartered in Calhoun, Georgia, in the late 1990s, the artificial surface changed the industry with a design intended to replicate real grass. The new system quickly began taking market share from AstroTurf, and is now the leader in the industry, the surface is composed of monofilament polyethylene blend fibers tufted into a polypropylene backing. The infill is composed of a layer of silica sand, a middle layer which is a mixture of sand and cryogenic rubber. The fibers are meant to replicate blades of grass, while the acts as a cushion. This cushion is intended to improve safety when compared to earlier artificial surfaces and allows players to plant, each square foot of turf contains approximately 3 kg of sand and 1.5 kg of cryogenic rubber. FieldTurf does not use shock absorbency pads below its infill, the backing of the turf is a combination of woven and non-woven polypropylene. These materials are permeable and allow water to drain through the backing itself, jean Prévost bought the patent of the FieldTurf product in 1988 and originally named his Montreal-based company SynTenni Co. a name which would eventually be dropped in favor of FieldTurf Inc. In 1995, John Gilman, a former Canadian Football League player and coach, in 1997, FieldTurf made its first major installation for a professional team, at the training facility for the English Premierships Middlesbrough F. C. As of 2012, FieldTurf has installed over 7000 athletic fields, in 2005, French flooring manufacturer and minority shareholder Tarkett increased its share in FieldTurf, which led to the integration of the two companies. FieldTurf is now a part of the Tarkett Sports division, part of the holding company Tarkett SA, the FieldTurf head corporate office is located in Calhoun, Georgia. In May 2010, FieldTurf acquired EasyTurf of San Diego, California, by late 2016, press reports were describing the companys product as defective. A number of agencies in New Jersey had joined together to file a lawsuit against the firm. The suits allege that the DuraSpine product it sold was inferior, internal company documents showed the company knew its sales claims were false. There is evidence showing higher player injury on artificial turf, in a study performed by the National Football League Injury and Safety Panel, published in the October 2012 issue of the American Journal of Sports Medicine, Elliott B. Hershman et al. reviewed injury data from NFL games played between 2000 and 2009. the injury rate of knee sprains as a whole was 22% higher on FieldTurf than on natural grass. While MCL sprains did not occur at a significantly higher than on grass. There are conflicting studies of the safety of FieldTurf, a five-year study funded by FieldTurf and published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine found that injury rates for high school sports were similar on natural grass and synthetic turf
