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Behind The Book: THE FURY
Behind the scenes of THE FURY
If a grief-blinded cop can't find the terrorist who murdered her husband, millions will die in a nerve-gas strike on the United States.
The Fury is a work of fiction, hatched entirely by my overly caffeinated brain. But many of my fictional scenes, from the cataclysmic destruction of the Deepwater Horizon oil platform to the Creamsicle-orange dress and stilettos worn by my hero, undercover police detective Superstition "Sue" Davis, were inspired by real events. Some were a hoot. Most would give sane people coronaries. All were fascinating, so Crimespree thought you'd be interested in a behind-the-scenes peek at the facts that fueled the fiction in my new global terrorism thriller:
Oil rig disappears: British Petroleum's Deepwater Horizon exploded in the Gulf of Mexico on April 10, 2010. Two hundred million gallons of crude oil and tons of methane gas were fire-hosed into the Gulf. The globby and highly toxic crude killed jobs, businesses, and wildlife. Its hellish power was exactly the hammer I needed to crack open this tale of terrorism and heroism.
Innocents lost: The drama of the oil spill overshadowed the fact that eleven workers died in agony that night. We remember the fireball and the whiny CEO and the oil-streaked pelicans, but not the names of the dead. Here they are, for the record: Jason Anderson, Aaron Burkeen, Donald Clark, Stephen Curtis, Gordon Jones, Roy Kemp, Karl Kleppinger, Keith Manuel, Dewey Revette, Shane Roshto, and Adam Weise.
The doomsday bombs: The "stars" of my plot are the VX Nerve Gas bombs that were fictionally scooped from the sandy floor of the Gulf of Mexico during the real-life destruction of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, and floated into the hands of fictional Mexican cartel strongman Jiménez "Jimmy" Garcia. Such VX bombs do exist—more on that in a minute—and sociopathic narco-gang chiefs are very real in Mexico.
Just how bad is VX? Badder than anything you can imagine, including death by fire ants, burning alive, or leaving your Kindle on the subway. VX nerve gas attacks your central nervous system by stopping your muscles from relaxing—arms, legs, eyelids, diaphragm, everything. Your body clenches harder and harder and harder, until you're curled into a comma. You can't take a breath, your lungs collapse, your heart stops, and you die. All that from one single drop anywhere on your body.
One (gulp!) drop? Take an eyedropper, fill with motor oil (the same oily viscosity and brownish color of nerve gas, BTW), and squeeze a drop on your finger. Look closely. That single drop will kill a full-grown adult. A nerve-gas warhead contains millions of drops. Do the math, destroy a population.
I heard Hitler invented VX? True? No, but he had his oily mustache in the early nerve gases. On Christmas Eve, 1936, a German chemist looking for a better pesticide invented the first nerve gas. He called it Tabun. He followed up a year later with the much more potent Sarin nerve gas. They couldn't be used on bugs—too dangerous for farmers to handle—but proved ideal as war weapons. The Nazis classified the research as top secret. But even Sarin is small beer compared to the mighty VX, which was invented by the British Empire. Ranajit Ghosh, a chemist for Imperial Chemical Industries in London, was, like his German counterpart Gerhardt Schrader at I.G. Farben, simply looking for a more efficient pesticide. He tinkered with the "organophosphate" compounds on which Tabun and Sarin were based, and came up with Amiton. Britain put it on the agricultural market in 1954, but it proved too lethal and was quickly yanked. The British Army took note, as armies do, sent samples to its biochemical research labs at Porton Down, and out came the world's most deadly industrial poison: "Nerve Agent VX." It was code-named "Purple Possum," as part of Britain's secret Rainbow Codes classification system, a charming piece of minutia from the war era.
We get our mitts on the stuff: Britain had VX. America had nukes. Each wanted the other, so we literally swapped recipes. Britain built a nuclear shield, and American factories pumped out VX like Sears Roebuck was stocking a half-off sale. If the Godless Commies sent their Hordes into Europe, by god, we'd spray 'em with VX, and if they kept on coming, we'd drop The Big One. One of the rockets we made to deliver a VX warhead (or nuclear, depending) was named "Honest John." (No, you can't make this stuff up.) The old Saturday morning cartoon "Beany and Cecil" in the 1960s contained sly references to "Dishonest John" and "No Bikini Atoll," the latter a singing salute to Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where America performed dozens of open-air atomic bomb tests and cast radiation and fallout for hundreds of miles.
We get rid of the stuff: In the middle of the Cold War, we decided our vast atomic arsenal would do the job after all. So President Richard Nixon asked the world to quit producing biological and chemical weapons and get rid of their stockpiles. Shockingly, the world went along and began decades of disposal efforts, which continue today. Unfortunately, disposal in the early days meant dumping the poisons into our water supply.
We poisoned our own oceans? In the late 1960s, the United States military crammed a fleet of mothballed freighters—the storied Liberty ships, which supplied Allied troops with everything from beans to bullets during World War II—with "obsolete" munitions, including radioactive material, mustard gas, Sarin, and the mighty VX. The ships were towed several miles off our shores and blown to the briny deep on the scientific theory of "out of sight, out of mind." The military termed the disposal program "Operation CHASE: Cut Holes and Sink 'Em."
A chaser for CHASE: We also unloaded bombs from barges, tossed barrels from moving ships, and built underwater poison heaps from Hawaii to Tokyo to Okinawa, in addition to the sites ringing the continental United States like so many land mines. The idea was noble enough: Poison gas is barbaric (and besides, we've got nukes!) so let's get rid of it. Nowadays, we safely neutralize industrial and military poisons in land-based facilities. (For example, the nerve gas we seized from Syria last year.) But that technology wasn't available when President Nixon convinced the world to deep-six its inventories. So into the sea it went.
Are those poison bombs still down there? Yes, and they still wash ashore time to time to injure or kill. The ocean floors are littered with thousands of obsolete munitions, from traditional TNT explosives to WWI mustard and lewisite gases to the WWII and Cold War nerve gases, including VX. (And one 55-gallon drum of contaminated U.S. Army cake batter. Go figure.) Contrary to the chest-thumping assurances of Cold Warrior scientists, many of the weapons remain active today, just waiting for something to trigger them. Bombs occasionally wash up on our shores and kill an unsuspecting worker or homeowner; commercial fishermen have snagged them in their nets with tragic results. No one can predict when—if ever—the weapons will become inert from cold, salt, and oceanic pressures.
Heartbreak at Bari: Adolf Hitler had plenty of nerve gas, thanks to Dr. Schrader's Tabun and Sarin. So President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered a freighter of mustard gas—a proven, if less efficient, World War I chemical—into the European Theater. FDR's orders to his generals were clear: Retaliatory only. Do not use unless they gas us first. The U.S. Liberty ship John Harvey containing that load would dock in an Allied-captured port on the Italian boot heel: Bari.
At daybreak on December 2, 1943, the John Harvey had been in port for days, stuck in the immense rush hour of freighters offloading supplies for Allied troops in Europe. Neither the John Harvey's captain nor the Chemical Warfare Service (now U.S. Army Chemical Corps) officers guarding the cargo could leapfrog the line for fear that Hitler's spies would be alerted to the 2,000 M47A1 gas bombs in the hold, each of which held sixty pounds of mustard gas.
At mid-day, Sir Arthur Coningham, pooh-bah of the Royal Air Forces, assured wire-service reporters that Germany was defeated in Italy and would never attack Bari, the main resupply port for Britain's Eighth Army and the U.S. Fifteenth Air Force. "I would regard it as a personal affront and insult," Coningham declared, "if the Luftwaffe would attempt any significant action in this area."
At mid-afternoon, a Luftwaffe reconnaissance pilot spotted stevedores unloading ships like armies of pack rats, and turned back to base to report his find. At sundown, one hundred and five Luftwaffe bombers—JU-88 Junkers—blew up the docks and twenty-eight loaded ships, including the John Harvey. Clouds of garlic-scented mustard gas spewed across port and town, blistering, maiming, and killing hundreds of soldiers, sailors, and civilians. Roosevelt and Churchill ordered the disaster hushed up, and the press of the era complied. But German spies found out anyway and informed Hitler.
Fearing that Bari was only the tip of Factory America's iceberg of nerve gas, Hitler decided never to nerve-gas the Allies lest they nerve-gas Germany back to the Stone Age. In truth, America didn't have nerve gas till the British invented VX in the 1950s. We literally dodged a chemical bullet.
Hitler was der Weenie: Yes, der Führer owned the famed Eagle's Nest, that gorgeous alpine chalet on the peak of the Kehlstein Mountain, which housed Third Reich headquarters in the Bavarian Alps, and where the Reich planned so many of its atrocities. But Adolf was deathly afraid of heights, so he rarely visited.
Dewey Defeats Truman: In a dispatch titled "Hitler Tamed in Prison," the New York Times reported in 1924 that Adolf Hitler had been tamed in prison and would live the remainder of his life humbled and harmless. But someone forgot to inform Hitler, and after he conquered most of Europe, a correction by the newspaper of record would seem . . . inadequate.
Psychopaths Incorporated: Are Mexican narcotics cartels as bloodthirsty as portrayed in my book? Do they really barbecue people on spits, decapitate soldiers, crucify informants, dynamite police stations, and terrorize entire cities? Yes. Narcotics trafficking is a multibillion-dollar industry that generates more profits than many Fortune 500 corporations, so there's plenty of money and power to justify anything, including mass murder. If anything, I soft-pedaled the horrendous violence carried out daily by the narcotraffickers against anyone who crosses them, from cops and soldiers to politicians and innocent citizens. It's why my fictional hero Superstition Davis is so hell-bent on destroying sociopathic "1821" cartel enforcer Jimmy Garcia in The Fury.
Is "1821" a real cartel? No. I invented Jimmy Garcia's cartel and named it for the year that Mexican rebels drove out the Spanish conquistadors that caused so much bloodshed and ruin in their three hundred years of occupation that followed Spain's invasion of the Aztec Empire.
Tunnels, tunnels everywhere: Smuggling tunnels play an important role in The Fury. But are they real? Yes. Hundreds of tunnels—some just wide enough for a man dragging a knapsack with his toes, others so spacious they contain lights, ventilation, and tracks for rail cars—have been found under the border since 2000. Officials believe hundreds more remain undetected, pipelining heroin, cocaine, and other narcotics to the cartels' biggest market: the United States. Most tunnels are dug by hand to elude U.S. Border Patrol sound detection equipment. Some are threaded into the network of drainage pipes that keep the various border towns from flooding during monsoons. More alarming is what the principal of a private security contractor told me in 2013: The construction crews are advised by tunnel engineers from Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed terrorist organization. Hezbollah has dug hundreds of holes in the desert to smuggle explosives, militiamen, and suicide bombers into Egypt and Israel, and it moved into Mexico after 9/11, in case the U.S. decided to retaliate against Iran and the ayatollahs wanted to counterattack. We didn't, so the cartels pay the engineers handsomely to stick around and dig. They are in northern Mexico to this day . . . waiting and watching.
Operation Fast and Furious: In 2009, the U.S. Justice Department decided it would be a swell idea for American gun dealers to sell arms to Mexico's narcotics cartels. The deep-cover sting would allow the vaunted ATF to trace the weapons and, when the time was right, round up the narco warlords, using the guns as evidence. Problem was, ATF lost track, and an estimated 1,400 assault weapons vanished into the hands of the world's most violent criminal gangs.
Deadly consequences: Some of those weapons turned up at murder scenes of American law enforcement officers, including that of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was shot to death in Peck Canyon, Arizona, in December 2010. Two assault rifles linked to the Fast and Furious sales to the cartels were found at the site. The killers were caught, tried, and sentenced. Agent Terry remains dead.
View the Vu: Readers of a certain age may remember my bad guy's good luck charm: the Scripto Vu-Lighter. The flint-wheel cigarette lighter was an icon of the 1960s, with its body molded from transparent material to show off the fishing fly, ad logo, or pinup girl bobbing in the lighter fluid. While less ubiquitous than the Zippo, it was more kitschy and fun.
Cops 'n' Feds: Do local police officers and FBI special agents really despise each other, or is that only in the movies? Well, let's just say that in real life they regard each other . . . warily. When the inevitable clashes arise between street cops and federal agents because of their differing agendas, cops deride agents as "Feebs"—short for "Feeble"—and the feds in turn call the locals hayseeds who'd screw up a one-car funeral. With all the tribal warfare, it's a wonder any criminals get caught.
Is the music club that's key to one scene real? Betcher sweet dimpled bahoola it is. ("Bahoola" is Chicago for "ass." Or so my sainted grandmother insisted.) Kingston Mines Blues Club opened on Chicago's North Side in 1968, and still proudly flaunts its tie-dyed roots: linoleum floors, mismatched chairs and tables, orangey kitchen lamps strung from the ceiling, and a cheesy front stage that looks a barnyard. Thunderous blues accompany the goodies from the in-house rib shack. It was my first choice for Superstition's secret transition from street cop to savior of humanity. (And why, yes, I did write the "Do-Me Blues" song featured in that chapter. Thanks for asking!)
Three streets walk into a bar: A city editor at the Chicago Sun-Times, my old newspaper haunt, told me this joke, the punchline of which is so quintessentially Chicago I had to drop it into a scene: "Only three Chicago streets rhyme with vagina: Paulina, Malvina, and Lunt."
Cream or Dream? Superstition Davis's undercover outfit—micro-dress and stiletto heels—is the neon orange of a Creamsicle. Or a bottle of Orange Crush, for those who prefer maximum sugary goodness. But what makes a Creamsicle different from a Dreamsicle? The insides. Creamsicles are ice cream, Dreamsicles are ice milk. (Were ice milk; sadly, Dreamsicles are no longer manufactured.) The shell is the same, though: a sugary orange sherbet.
Shane Gericke is the bestselling author of The Fury, Torn Apart, and other thrillers. He lives outside Chicago, and spent years as a newspaper editor, most prominently at the Chicago Sun-Times, before switching to crime fiction.
An original member of International Thriller Writers, he was chairman of the ThrillerFest literary festival in New York City and founding director of its agent-author matching program, PitchFest. He's judged the Edgar, Thriller, MWA, and St. Martin's awards, and belongs to Mystery Writers of America and the Society of Midland Authors.
He lives in the Chicago suburb of Naperville, the home of world-famous detective Dick Tracy, with whom Shane shares no resemblance except steely jaw and manly visage. Please visit him at www.shanegericke.com, www.thefurybook.com, Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, and Goodreads


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The Watergate Scandal
This content was COPIED from BrainMass.com - View the original, and get the already-completed solution here!
How has the Watergate scandal affected the way Americans feel about their government? This posting includes specific examples.© BrainMass Inc. brainmass.com October 9, 2019, 9:13 pm ad1c9bdddf
Solution Preview
As you offer your ideas, please allow some of my opinions to help you about this vast topic:
First, as you discuss how the Watergate scandal affected the way Americans feel about their government, please note that it made feelings of mistrust prevail and dominate for the majority of citizens. For example, Nixon's unethical activities of criminal obstruction of justice and improper and illegal use of governmental organizations such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency and the Internal Revenue Service, made many Americans wary of presidents and governmental officials at large. It seemed to question and cast doubt over the ethical and moral character of presidents and governmental representatives overall.
Similarly, you might add that because presidents and governmental officials are supposed to protect Americans and their freedoms and also uphold America's fundamental democratic ideologies, the American public lost a lot of hope and trust in this promise. To illustrate, please note that Nixon's violation of his constitutional oath coupled with his unlawful entry into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee to gather political intelligence also threatened our election equity.
By abusing his powers, Nixon placed grave concern about election fairness into ...
Solution Summary
The Watergate Scandal is emphasized.

subset: commoncrawl


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Dining Rights and Guest Rooms
Members who hold an MA or other Master's degree or a higher degree from the University, or are qualified for an MA, are welcome to dine in College during Full Term or the period of residence in the Long Vacation. For the academic year 2019-2020, 'Full Term' means 8 October to 6 December, 14 January to 13 March, and 21 April to 12 June; residence in the Long Vacation runs for five weeks from early July.
- Dining for Members is available on any evening of the week during term or Long Vacation Residence except Tuesday or Saturday and on occasions when large College events take place.
- A Member may dine as a guest of the College at High Table up to four times each academic year (once a term and once in the Long Vacation residence), provided a Fellow is present to preside. On one of those occasions, if it is available, overnight accommodation is free of charge for the Member.
- If a Member is attending a Members' Evening with a guest, and sharing a guest room, the charge is waived.
It is regrettably not normally possible for spouses/partners to dine at the High Table. However, for the academic year 2019-2020, the College will hold six "Members' Evenings", when up to five Members and their guests (ten people in all) may dine at the College's expense. It is recommended that large parties of Members, or Members and their spouses/partners, should seek to use these evenings as particularly good opportunities to dine in the College.
The dates of these occasions in 2019-20 are: (in 2019) Monday 21 October and Sunday 10 November, and (in 2020) Monday 20 January and Sunday 23 February, Wednesday 6 May and Sunday 7 June. Attendance by a Member and their spouse at these Evenings is now restricted to two per annum, to allow as many Pembroke Members as possible to avail themselves of this opportunity.
On the evening that you have booked in to dine, we would be grateful if you could arrive at the Senior Parlour no later than 7.15pm for drinks before dinner. The dress code is smart but it is not necessary to wear a gown.
Guest rooms
- Overnight accommodation may also be available in College, at a reasonable charge (one person £56, two people £83 per night, for the current academic year).
- Accommodation is available for a visit of a maximum of two consecutive nights.
- Guest rooms may only be booked by Fellows or Pembroke Members. If a Pembroke Member books the room, he or she should be the one, or one of the people, to stay in it. It is not normally possible to reserve rooms for non-Pembroke Members.
- As mentioned above, overnight accommodation is free of charge for the Member, once a year, if a room is available when a Member dines as a guest of the College at High Table.
- The College regrets that children under the age of fourteen are unable to stay overnight at Pembroke.
The College has four en suite guest rooms (one twin-bedded room in H staircase and three double-bedded rooms in G, H and K staircases). Given these limited facilities, early notice is strongly advised when making enquiries.
The College would be grateful to be informed at the earliest opportunity if a Member's plans to visit have to be amended. Pembroke regrets that it will be necessary to charge a Member for the full cost of the room in the event that that Member should cancel his or her visit without giving at least 24 hours' notice.
College accommodation is usually available from 2pm on the day of arrival; guests are asked to check out and remove their luggage before 9.30am on the day of departure (but the Porters' Lodge can store luggage until later in the day if necessary). Breakfast is not included in the charge but Members are welcome to have breakfast in the Buttery (usually open Monday to Friday between 8am and 10am and for brunch on Saturday and Sunday between 10am and 1.15pm), which can be paid for with cash, card, Apple Pay or Android Pay.
How to book
Arrangements for dining or for staying in a guest room should be made by completing and submitting the Accommodation and Dining Online Booking Form. If you experience any difficulties using the online form, please phone the Development Office on +44 (0)1223 339079 or email firstname.lastname@example.com. A provisional guest room booking will be made on receipt of the enquiry. We ask that payment be made within one working day of booking to confirm the booking by telephoning +44 (0)1223 339079 with your payment details. A full refund can be provided if the booking is cancelled with at least 24 hours' notice.


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Category Archives: Celebrity Style
Dazzling Devi for The Grammys!
Bejeweling TV Host + Radio Personality Devi Dev for The Grammys 2016 red carpet was such a pleasure. If you know Devi, or don't know her and simply follow her, then either way you know she is an absolute bright spirit radiating with positive energy.
In addition being a beauty and one of the hardest working girls I know, the California native who calls Houston, Texas home is truly a sweetheart. I was delighted to dazzle her in diamonds and gems that complimented her personality and wardrobe for her big night.
Of the 20 plus options of fine jewels supplied her to choose from I knew she would gravitate toward this pair pictured below.
Designed by the Houston-based jewelry alterier SUTRA Jewels, this stunning suite of rare green tourmalines set in 18K yellow gold and is encrusted in pave white diamonds and antique rose-cut champagne diamonds.
The extravagant chandelier earrings featured over 27 carats of green tourmaline and 17 carats of diamonds, while the show-stopping dome ring donned 18 carats of green tourmaline, 2 carats of accented green garnet as the halo and 11 carats of diamonds
#BTS of Devi's Jewels
Devi Dev Grammy's Look:
Jewelry: SUTRA
Dress: Nicole Bakti
Jewelry Styled by: Callye Peyrovi
Wardrobe Styled by: Ashley Dunn
For more on Devi Dev visit her website: www.devidev.com & follow her @DeviBrown
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So So Sophia!
Hollywood's sexiest latin lady of the red carpet, Sofia Vergara, has partnered with Kay® Jewelers to launch her jewelry collection, aptly named SOFIA VERGARA so Sofia™.
The collection captures the look of fine jewelry at an affordable price. Sofia's cheerful, vibrant and sultry style shines through many of the pieces in the collection.
She pays homage to her home country of Columbia by inserting hidden hints of emeralds in the sides and under galleries of the jewelry. She has created for the public a collection that showcases her personal taste. She recently donned two pieces of So Sophia, before announcing the line, creating a media frenzy suggesting she had gotten engaged to her beau. A genius PR move on her part to promote the unveling of the line!
Sofia is about as obsessed with jewels as they come. I have had the pleasure of working with her style team in the past and she is definitely hands on with the accessories that make up her finishing looks.
While you're not getting the luxurious jewels that Sophia adorns on the red carpet, you can purchase her signature line at a fraction of the cost in sterling silver and 10K gold creations with lab created bold gemstones and genuine diamonds.
The SOFIA VERGARA so Sofia™ collection is available exclusively at select Kay® Jewelers stores or online at kay.com and retails from $230 – $1600 USD.
Kudos Sophia! See some of my picks from the collection here:
J.Lo dazzles in Diamonds by Yeprem at World Cup 2014
Been tuning in to World Cup festivities? Germany took the title and Argentinians lost their marbles in the street riots they caused in their home country. Seriously? Get over it! There can only be one winner! No need for violence and vandalism.
However, I will tell you where everybody won; getting to see JLo do her thing at the opening ceremony! Her performance was highly anticipated as she was scheduled to perform and nearly didn't make it this year.
The Bronx beauty was stunning in all her Brazilian looks (minus her ice princess tights) and most notably decked out in Yeprem Jewels! See this designer's cool ear spikes, elaborate rings and blinged out bracelets below that the design house posted.
In case you missed it watch here: JLo FIFA World Cup Performance
Think PINK but Top it with Turquoise!
I happen to be a little obsessed with pink and turquoise looks on the red carpet. I don't think it all has to do with them both being my favorite colors but rather the way the two sing in harmony while still making bold contrast statements when paired perfectly! In recent fashion history we have seen many jaw-dropping looks from leading ladies of Hollywood such as Cameron Diaz (circa 2007 in Dior + Fred Leighton) and Jessica Alba (Circa 2013 in Reem Acra + Wendy Yu / Sutra). However, recently Emmy Rossum surprised us all when she stepped out like a grown woman [that was in my Beyonce voice] at this year's Critic Choice Awards.
See Emmy Rossum rock it in a popping pink separates ensemble from Monique Lhuillier topped off with 77 carats of oversized Sutra turquoise earrings including nearly 5 carats of dazzling rose cut diamonds and round brilliants in the halo.
Take walk down Met Ball memory lane: Christian Dior 2007 & Fred Leighton vault jewels
2013 Fantasy Bra – Victoria Secret Fashion Show
Every year it's the one holiday event that both men and women agree to watch, the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, except with completely different agendas in mind!
Generally speaking it's a plethora of push-up bra plentiful beauties strutting their stuff down a catwalk that excites the demographic which is normally tuned into football – but for the ladies it's so much more. WE LOVE IT ALL! The gorgeous nearly mystic women we've learned to call "angels", the clothes – or lack there of, the fashion, the music and artful. But most importantly the breathtaking finale bra that cost more than 99% of women's engagement rings!
Victoria's Secret typically presents jewelers with a choice of several themes and then hands over the entire design process to them.This year the lucky angel was Candice Swanpoel who sported the bra designed by jeweler Mouawad while Taylor Swift rocked the stage. This was a surprise for me since it's been done by London Jewelers for the last two years in a row.
Mouawad's bra appropriately named "The Royal" consisted of 4,200 precious stones like rubies and yellow sapphires while the focal point was a 52 carat tear drop ruby! The model admitted that walking around in a $10 million fit made her nervous. I would have been too but sometimes a girl just has to get into Elizabeth Taylor character and own the night in a masterpiece like that!
"They had to mold my body to be able to make the bra and I was really excited," Swanepoel told PEOPLE. The South African beauty followed in the footsteps of Miranda Kerr, Tyra Banks, Gisele Bündchen, Heidi Klum and Alessandra Ambrosio by wearing the annual mind boggling brazier!
I still can't forget last year's $2.5 million floral creation by London Jewelers worn by Alessandra Ambrosio as she strutted down the catwalk to Rihanna. I about died when I saw her in those orchid wings!
Last year's feminine floral design was inspired by an Angels in Bloom theme, a fantasy garden filled with vibrant colored flowers. London Jewelers adorned some 5,200 precious gems: amethysts, sapphires, tsavorites, rubies, and white, pink, and yellow diamonds set in 18k rose and yellow gold. It was equipped with two detachable flower pins and a drop centerpiece with a 20 carat white diamond. The value of the bra and belt combined: $2.5 million. Marketing the bustier a Bombshell Fantasy Fragrance bottle was encrusted with amethysts, sapphires, rubies, tsavorites, white, pink, and yellow diamonds, a 10 ct. white diamond, and a hand-carved tourmaline butterfly. The eau de parfum and its decadent packaging was priced at $500,000.
The Angels in Bloom theme lent itself best to jewelry, according to London Jewelers vice president Randi Udell-Alper. It also follows a colorful direction that's becoming more prevalent in the industry. "We did an ombré effect in the pinks, yellows, and colored stones," she says. "It was classic and funky at the same time."
London Jewelers' master craftsmen sifted through some 15,000 stones to find the perfectly-colored, -sized and -shaped gems; it took them 400 hours to select and—one by one—hand-set the stones in the bra set and fragrance bottle.
"It was a lot of time, effort, and labor from a jeweler's standpoint," said Udell-Alper. "We welded everything onto the bra." Asked why London Jewelers took on the arduous task, Udell-Alper said, "We love doing anything different from other jewelers. We always look to find cutting-edge. Yet we're still in our roots and foundation as family-owned."
The bra set and fragrance were created exclusively for Victoria's Secret's new three-story flagship at Herald Square in New York City.
Met Ball Madness
I Like My Bling Down Low!
At this year's 2012 Met Ball I noticed quite the trend in celebrities accessorizing mainly below the belt! Most went bare from the neck up and stuck to a simple drop or stud, if even that. Although my best dressed awards go to Kate Blanchette, Diane Kruger and Beyonce, I was quite underwhelmed with the jewelry selection for the red carpet as a whole. However, there were a few that wowed me with their irresistible arm candy! Jessica Stam killed it with her bracelets stacked like gem encrusted Jenga towers on each side of her body.
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Tim and his group have been wonderful to work with. They have been responsive to our request, patient, flexible and great to work with. They have been professional, responsive and provided excellent training, guidance and consulting on the simplest way to handle our requirements. I would highly recommend their services.
Thank you.....
Jeff Mitchell
CFA Florida Chapter President
(813) 205-1538
Thank you.....
Jeff Mitchell
CFA Florida Chapter President
(813) 205-1538
Date of Posting: 15 November 2012
Posted By: Jeff mitchell
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Unifour Family Practice
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Posted By: Kari Carpenter
Posted By: Kari Carpenter
Our church had a very plain and simple website for many years due to our lack of ability to create what we truly needed to reach the community for Christ. We were blessed to be led to STB, who helped make our website engaging and dynamic and more than we could have ever hoped for. The level of customer service was amazing in that my emails and phone calls were answered very quickly and Tim was very patient with those of us who were new at website development. This experience has left me, personally, feeling very capable when it comes to managing the church website and very secure in the knowledge that our website and email server are managed by such a professional and courteous team. Thanks STB!
Date of Posting: 20 April 2011
Posted By: Monica Humpal
Posted By: Monica Humpal
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What are chakras?
The word chakra means wheel and are points of whirling energy within the human body. The chakras get charged from cosmic energy and regulates its flow of energy through our electrical network called the meridians. This energy is considered to be our main energy and runs up and down from the top of our head to our spine. These wheels of energy dictate our psychological, mental and physical wellbeing. If blocked or over active you will develop physical and/or mental illness and emotionally get out of balance. The first evidence of our knowledge to the chakras was written in the ancient texts called The Vedas. Until recently it's only been theory and a good laugh for skeptics, but with new technology, science have finally proven they exist. There are seven main energy points as shown in the illustration and they all have different frequencies, and every frequency/chakra has it's purpose. When all our chakras are in perfect balance our life becomes joyful and harmonious with good health and with a genuine passion and love for life.
1. Root chakra – Muladhara (400 – 484hz)
This chakra represents grounding and is related to instinct, security and to basic human potentiality. If your energy is flowing good in the Muladhara you'll feel present and at-ease in every situation. If your energy is blocked it can result in greed, fear, nervousness and failure. Related health problems are hemorrhoids, blood and nerve disorder, sciatica and lower backaches.
- Physically it governs sexuality
- Mentally it governs stability
- Emotionally it governs sensuality
- Spiritually it governs a sens of security
2. Sacral chakra – Svadhishthana (484 – 508hz)
This chakra is related to our acceptance of others into our lives and how we process and connect with new people and experiences in life. The Scadhishthana affects our pleasure, sexuality, openness and passion. If your second chakra is overly active you'll be overly emotional. If it's blocked you'll be stiff and not open to new things or people. Health problems related to blockage are diabetes, kidney and spleen disorder, and digestion.
- Physically it governs reproduction
- Mentally it governs creativity
- Emotionally it governs joy
- Spiritually is governs enthusiasm
3. Solar plexus – Manipura (508 – 526hz)
Manipura represent our ability to be in control of our own life confidently. It's where your self-worth and your self-esteem comes from. When blocked you might get issues with personal power, fear, anxiety, opinion-formation, introversion, and transition from simple or base emotions to complex. If it's over active it can result in aggressive and dominating behavior. Health problems related to unbalance in the solar plexus are ulcers, intestinal disorder, poor circulation and liver dysfunction.
- Physically it governs digestion
- Mentally it governs personal power
- Emotionally it governs expansiveness
- Spiritually it governs all matters of growth
4. Heart chakra – Anahata (526 – 606hz)
The heart chakra obviously represent our ability to love. Its responsible for your love, inner peace and joy. If Anahata is balanced you'll be open and compassionate. A blocked hearth chakra makes you distant and cold, and if its over active your love might be selfish, suffocating, envious and/or overbearing. Related health problems are angina, arthritis, heart palpitations, blood pressure and ulcers.
- Physically it governs circulation
- Emotionally it governs unconditional love for the self and others
- Mentally it governs passion
- Spiritually it governs devotion
5. Throat chakra – Vishuddha (606 – 670hz)
This chakra represents our ability to communicate. If it is balanced we speak truthful and openly express our thoughts and emotions. If your throat chakra is blocked you'll get shy and introverted. If its overly active you'll dominate conversations without listening to others. Health problems related to an unbalanced throat chakra are flu, respiratory problems, thyroid problems, fever, throat infections and rheumatism.
- Physically it governs communication
- Emotionally it governs independence
- Mentally it governs fluent thought
- Spiritually it governs a sense of security
6. Third Eye – Ajna (670 – 700hz)
Related to your intuition and wisdom. When balanced you will feel a sense of clarity and it will be easy to take decisions. When there is a blockage you'll easily feel confused and let others do the thinking for you. If it's over active you're living in a fantasy world where you might even hallucinate. This might happen because the chakra is related to the pineal gland which is the production site of the psychedelic DMT(dimethyltryptamine), the only known hallucinogen endogenous to the human body.
- Mentally it governs visual consciousness
- Emotionally it governs clarity on an intuitive level.
7. Crown chakra – Sahasrara (700 – 789hz)
Represents your connection to your inner spirit and your higher self. When your Sahasrara is in balance you see the beauty of the world and the connectedness. When its blocked you are rigid and out of touch. When its over active you are only thinking about things intellectually and thereby missing the magic of the universe.
How can we heal our chakras?
The most common and probably one of the most effective way of healing our flow of energy is meditation. There are many ways of meditation, but using affirmations as you meditate might be the most effective, because our thoughts create our reality. Here are some tips on affirmations for each chakra:
- Root chakra: "I am a divine being of light, and I am peaceful, protected and secure"
- Sacral: "I am radiant, beautiful and strong and enjoy a healthy and passionate life"
- Solar plexus: "I am positively empowered and successful in all my ventures"
- Heart chakra: "Love is the answer to everything in life, and I give and receive love effortlessly and unconditionally"
- Throat chakra: "My thoughts are positive, and I always express myself truthfully and clearly"
- Third eye: "I am tuned into the divine universal wisdom and always understand the true meaning of life situations"
- Crown: "I am complete and one with the divine energy"
Personally I think the important thing is to find an affirmation that suits your feelings. Try to figure out what you need to hear. I myself used: "I am enough", "I am fantastic", "Nothing can touch me" and "I love my self". The first time I did this I started to feel really nauseous and had to run to the bathroom in case I would vomit. It felt like I had a resistance in my solar plexus, something was blocking the energy I was trying to put in. Shortly the nausea went away and as the days went by I realized that I were behaving more confident than usual. I felt more free to act on my impulses than before, without as much thought on how others might perceive me. Although I had a pretty quick reaction, you might need to do this daily for a couple of weeks. The more you do it, the better and faster it works. Its also important to try your best to feel what you're saying as well. It's ok if you don't, but try your best and suddenly you'll get there. This is also something you can do while doing your daily routines. Just go nuts with telling yourself how amazing you are and believe it.
Another form of meditation that would work is the popular mindfulness. Mindfulness is all about tuning in to the present moment. Feeling your body. Getting to know your spirit and mind. Blockages in chakras are often linked to your past or future. Traumas or worries, anxiety and depression. Sit down in a place you wont be disturbed, put on some relaxing music (preferably in 432hz). Close your eyes and feel your breath as you inhale through your nose and exhale through your mouth. Take a few minutes to acknowledge your body from tip to toe. In order to keep a calm mind without getting disturbed by thoughts, counting your breathing can be very effective. Try counting inhales and exhales to 21 three times in a row. If you loose track you start over. If it's too hard, try 14 or 7. If its too easy you can try a higher number or try just to count when you inhale.
Being in nature
Being out in nature is also a good way of getting grounded and recalibrate our minds. There is something about the society that constantly drags us into the future or back in the past. While you're out there, take of your shoes and socks. The ultimate way of getting grounded is getting your feet in the ground. Walking barefoot in nature is healing in so many ways. The direct contact triggers energy points as well as you absorb minerals. And apparently, we're drawing electrons from the earth which improves our health. According to a review published in the Journal of Environmental and Public Health where they looked at a number of studies they found that it changed the electrical activity in the brain(measured by electroencephalograms). Other research found that grounding benefited skin conductivity, moderated heart rate variability, improved glucose regulation, reduced stress and boosted immunity. It is also known that walking barefoot improves your overall posture as you are not smacking your heel to the ground with every step. The benefits of walking barefoot in nature are huge. They are in fact so huge that I will write another entry just on this topic shorty.
A healthy diet
A healthy diet has a huge impact on how we feel and think. When it comes to diets I think it's very individual and from what I've read about healing chakras with food I'm not sure what to trust. Some say you should eat the color of the chakra while some refer to where the foods are grown. What I do know is that fresh, organic vegetables and fruits have a lot of enzymes and are highly nutrient and keeps you on a high frequency whereas fastfood, red meat, refined sugar and chemical additives such as the E-numbers keeps you on a low frequency. From my own experience I can say that when I shifted to a healthy diet it had a huge impact on my energy and mood. But in the end I think the journey towards a healthy diet is an individual one, so I'm not going to leave it with this. Either way. Take care of your body, its the only place you have to live.
Being open and talk about your feelings
By suppressing emotions and feelings you create a separation between spirit and mind. The longer you suppress, the longer the distance. The longer the distance, the harder it gets. When the distance is great its easy to get lost. As you're standing there on a huge plain in the dusk of dawn, confused and helpless, it can be very helpful to have a guiding friend. Be brave and leave your shame and see that the answers will come to you as you walk.
If you have any thoughts or experiences on the subject, please expose your enlightenment in the comments below 🙂
If you liked this post, please share 🙂


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How do you justify a $10 Billion Valuation?
This article was contributed to CongRegation 14 (#cong14) at congregation.ie in which the author participated. Visit the website to view this great social media gathering event!
Astronomical valuations for tech companies are nothing new, in fact it's commonplace nowadays. The tricky part is justifying these sky high estimations and that problem becomes even harder when the company doesn't have any real turnover to date. This is Snapchat's problem. Yes Snapchat, the app made famous for being used by teens and others alike to send each other disappearing sexts, is apparently worth US$10 Billion! Maybe proving once and for all that there's no such thing as bad publicity.
So how do you attempt to validate, and more importantly monetise, an app with such a large estimated worth but no real turnover? Snapchat might just have the answer. Earlier this year Snapchat added a new feature called Our Story to its Recent Updates section. The Our Story feature is a central live feed of user generated videos and pictures usually lasting 2-3 minutes from a particular global event. Users can contribute to the Our Story feature by having their location services enabled to prove they are at the event before submitting their content for review by Snapchat. All of the content from the live feed can be viewed multiple times but only lasts for 24 hours or the duration of the event.
Initially Our Story was tested at a handful of music festivals like EDC and Lollapalooza and after great engagement with users was rolled out to more events such as American College Football games, The FIFA World Cup and even things a bit more obscure like Dia de Los Muertos (Day of the Dead) in Mexico City and the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, the world's largest hot air balloon festival. The addition of the Our Story feature has proven a roaring success for the company. According to Snapchat the number of daily views for their Stories has now surpassed the number of daily views for individual snaps and stands at over 1 billion.
What's more impressive than the numbers though is the thinking behind the move towards live events. In doing so, Snapchat has created a new era of event participation and live broadcast by giving users the chance to experience, and contribute to, global events from multiple points of view in near real time with ease and convenience. The Stories are always expertly edited and deliver exactly what the name implies, a story of the given event from beginning to end, and for the first time ever allows users access to what in the past would have gone unseen. The American College Football Stories usually show fans en route to the game, behind the scenes footage from both teams dressing rooms shot by the players themselves, a fans view of a touchdown from the packed crowd, songs being sung by the fans and finally who won! According to Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel more people are watching College Football on Snapchat than on TV (100m vs. 2.6m). This high level of engagement not only helps to build a sense of community for Snapchat it also attracts new users who may have been turned off in the past by their unjust seedy reputation.
In October the company expanded its Stories feature to include College Campus, a brief insight into daily college life at 4 US colleges, UCLA and Penn State among them, with a live feed of campus generated content. Except this time Snapchat tried a bit of clever marketing by limiting the ability to both post and watch the feed to users actually on the college campus. Creating exclusivity around the College Campus Stories feature is a great way to increase demand for it and who knows maybe even improve class attendance rates for fear of missing out!
By making the move into live broadcast Snapchat has not only diversified its product and strengthened its brand, they've also managed to figure out a way to monetise an app for self-destructing photos and videos. One option available might be to offer sponsorship of a live event in the Our Story feature. This would be less intrusive to users than sponsored ads on or before individual snaps and also offer advertisers better targeting and fit for their brand. In October this year Snapchat rolled out its first sponsored ad. A twenty second trailer for the horror film Ouija, paid for and specially edited by Universal Studios to play in a similar fashion to other Stories. And this is what excites marketers and advertisers most about Snapchat, it's not their 100 million monthly active users, although that sure helps, it's the similarity to TV advertising that their platform provides. For now the Stories only last for between 2-3 minutes, but this could easily be increased as could the 24 hour lifetime.
Snapchat has also reportedly held negotiations to distribute other media content from both traditional mass media outlets like Time and CNN as well as new media from Vice, Spotify and Vevo in a new section within the app called Discover. And the news earlier this week could give a hint of another possible revenue stream Snapchat has in mind for the future, SnapCash. A joint venture with Square to offer users a Peer-to-Peer payment feature that has initially been advertised as being a handy way to send friends money. But who's to say it couldn't one day be used to pay for admission to an event, or extended behind the scenes footage, or a new music video not available elsewhere. The possibilities are limitless, much like Snapchats future seems to be if they can continue to grow and innovate with such ease. $10 Billion could even end up looking like a bargain in a couple of years!


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The King's IoPPN Clinician Investigator Scholarship was established in January 2017, through a generous philanthropic donation, to support masters and PhD scholarships in the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN). The IoPPN is a leading centre for mental health and related neurosciences research in Europe. It is one of the top 25 higher education institutions in the world, and ranked 1st in Europe for Psychiatry & Psychology.
What is the King's IoPPN Clinician Investigator Scholarship?
The scholarships are aimed at encouraging current MBBS students and GKT Medical School Alumni to pursue research in the area of mental health and neurosciences. This scholarship will be awarded based on merit.
The scholarships are available for all full-time Home/EU fee status students undertaking masters and PhD programmes in the IoPPN, starting in Sept 2017.
Each student will receive a £20,000 scholarship, for the duration of their studies, per year.
Am I eligible?
For the Masters' Programmes, applicants must:
- be planning to undertake a MSc at the IoPPN or have firmly accepted an offer of a place;
- be a graduate of GKT School of Medicine or its affiliates, or if an undergraduate, must have completed at least 3 years of their MBBS course, and have undertaken a clinical attachment in either psychiatry or neurology;
- agree to provide an end of year report and a letter of thanks to the donor and attend events where necessary.
- provide a written personal statement (up to 1000 words) including:
- why they wish to undertake this course of study;
- an example of a piece of academic work (e.g. a scientific publication or clinical report) that they have undertaken;
- evidence of strong academic ability
For the PhD/MD (Res) Programmes, applicants must:
- have firmly accepted an offer of a studentship at the IoPPN or have had a proposal for a PhD or MD(Res) approved by the relevant KCL/IoPPN Higher Degrees committee:
- be a graduate of GKT School of Medicine, or be about to graduate, or be an intercalating MBBS student at GKT (PhD only)
- agree to provide end of year reports annually during the course of their study and a letter of thanks to the donor on completion of their degree and attend events where necessary
- provide an outline of their research proposal
- provide a written personal statement (up to 1500 words) including:
- why they wish to undertake a research degree in the fields of psychiatry/psychology/neuroscience
- an example of a piece of academic work (eg a scientific publication or clinical report) that they have undertaken
- evidence of strong academic ability
How do I apply?
The application form should be completed, scanned and emailed to firstname.lastname@example.com.
Alternatively it may be posted to Student Funding Office.
You must submit word/pdf versions of your supporting statement and research proposal. These should be emailed to email@example.com.
The deadline for applications is 30 June2017.
When will I know the outcome of my application?
Provided your application form has been accurately completed and the appropriate documentary evidence supplied, you will be notified of the decision by 31 July 2017.
Deposits are not required until a decision has been made on the scholarships, unsuccessful scholarship candidates will need to pay their programme deposit within two weeks of the outcome.
Where can I get further information?
To find out more about the Scholarship scheme, please contact the Student Funding Office.


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See that smile? #OhMyHeart! Can we have more of that, please?
Ryu Joon Yeol is really an amazing discovery not only for the week but for the year. He is currently slaying the hearts of all Team Jung Hwan in Answer Me 1988.
Rye Jun Yeol is a type of guy that you'd fall in love with, not at first sight, but when you get to know and see him more. I'm totally swooning in his scenes, especially with Hye Ri. I'm also frustrated with how slow he is in making "the moves" (or the lack thereof) but I do understand where he's coming from. He's thinking whether or not to cross the DMZ, that's how dangerous he is right now. I mean, it's not just about pursuing Deok Sun but the danger of breaking his friendship with Taek. This is not an ideal situation though I have to admit I do want to strangle him and say "Don't overthink, just love her!". Then again, it's his call not mine. I don't want to torture myself for the second time.
I started noticing Jung Hwan way back in Episode 1, when he was acting so cool while his family were all cheering for Deok Sun as she appears on TV for the Olympics opening ceremony. His smile had me at hello. When I saw him dance, he just killed me. The moment he finally realised that he likes Deok Sun, I think Ryu Joon Yeol sent me over to the moon. The umbrella-rainy-scenes and all the bus scenes with Hye Ri are amazing ways to fall more in love with him. And when he showed his love for his parents, I thought to myself he should be the husband. But then Taek happen.. both guys deserve love and I don't know how this series will give them that.
Moving on.
I love to see you with Deok Sun. Jung Hwan-ah, my patience is long, but don't make me hate waiting for you. DO SOMETHING. Make that move and don't back-out any longer.
See you next time! I'm off to watch Episode 16 before the two weeks hiatus starts.


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Winter Squash Stuffed with Wild Rice, Toasted Pecans & Dried Cherries
I love finding a recipe that will be my new go-to recipe for entertaining. We had company for dinner, and since we're observing a Daniel Fast, this was our main course using acorn squash. The next evening, we served a soup and had this as a side using pumpkins. The rice is amazing alone, but pared with the winter squash, it is remarkable. This would be beautiful gracing any holiday table.Pin It


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The Ferrari 360 Modena was a significant car for Ferrari, employing emerging technologies for design and manufacturing and raising the performance bar for the supercar industry.
Easton, PA (PRWEB) January 13, 2014
The all-new Cigar Advisor Magazine is an online cigar magazine that brings a fresh, irreverent, and down-to-earth perspective on all things cigars to thousands of smokers. In addition to educational cigar content and behind-the-scenes cigar industry articles from some of the business's top names, Cigar Advisor delivers an array of content about a variety of topics of interest to people who enjoy the cigar lifestyle. The magazine also features cigar reviews and ratings submitted by real smokers, and much more. Cigar Advisor Magazine has published a new article in its January edition. Entitled "The Ferrari 360 Modena: Still Sexy 15 Years Later," the article was written by Cigar Advisor contributor and ElegantMotorcars.com proprietor Todd Crossley. This article was published as a photo essay about the Ferrari 360 Modena.
Crossley begin the article with a discussion of Ferrari's roots. The Italian motor company's first road car was the 1947 125 Sport, which was powered by a 1.5 liter V12 engine. In 1950, Ferrari began fielding cars in Grand Prix Racing, and earned its first F1 World Championship in 1952. That tradition of success has translated to all forms of motorsports, and continues today, according to Crossley.
The F360 featured in the article was introduced in 1999 at the Geneva Auto Show. According to the article, "Instantly the car received praise for its stellar performance and its all-new curvaceous body. It was offered in a coupe (Modena) and a convertible (Spider). It was a significant car for Ferrari, employing emerging technologies for design and manufacturing and raising the performance bar for the supercar industry."
Some of those technologies included optional paddle shifters, extensive use of aluminum, and a 3.6-liter V8 that was capable of outputting 400 horsepower at 8,500 RPM. Additionally, the car's suspension was driver-adjustable, with Normal and Sport settings.
About Cigar Advisor Magazine
Cigar Advisor magazine is a digital publication created for real cigar enthusiasts who love tobacco and live the lifestyle. Cigar smokers are passionate about almost everything they do - whether it's the drinks they savor, the food they devour, the cars and motorcycles they dream of, the sports they're fanatical about or the women they love, Cigar Advisor shares those passions with a razor-sharp edge, soaking up each day and experience as if it were our last. Find that passion and more on display at CigarAdvisor.com.


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It is the policy of ARI to operate its business as a sound environmental corporate citizen in compliance with Vermont, Federal, and International Law, and continually improve the overall system. Our goal is to ensure that company facilities and operations are in compliance with federal, state and local environmental standards as well as civil law contract standards under procurement we have been awarded. We believe that balance can and should be sustained between environmental goals and economic health. We intend to be a leader in responsible environmental management throughout our industries. The environmental management systems will define objectives and targets for the prevention and reduction of pollution associated with handling end-of-life electronics and related processes, as well as reuse and repair, to safeguard adverse impact on the environment. This requires each ARI employee to participate in and accept responsibility for achieving the following objectives:
All ARI facilities will
To the extent that it is possible and/or required by contract, law, or internal policy, these objectives also apply to downstream vendors and processes. Good Point Recycling would like to foster a safe, healthy environment, for our employees are is committed to preventing injury or illness as a result of its business practices. In addition, we strive to ensure that our vendors do likewise. We believe that the most important component to running a responsible business is to encourage a culture of openness. Our EHS policies are shaped by this goal of transparency and communication at every level of operation. Collecting and making use of EHS data is also very important. GPR is working hard to strong measures and systems to build a base of knowledge on which to act. We will ensure a hierarchy of reuse, recovery, and disposal for our clients.
Specific strategies ARI has engaged in to meet the above objectives include our Fair Trade Recycling initiative, as well as R2 Certification. Our Fair Trade Recycling Initiative was created to address the "reuse, recover, dispose" hierarchy. Our process addresses the conflict that arises between market demand abroad and potential polluting practices from recycling in poorly regulated parts of the world. R2 Certification represents a commitment by ARI to developing a certified EHSMS, as well as due diligence in tracking FM through our facility to their final disposition. This policy will be communicated to all parties interested in the performance of our environmental management system.


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Planet RE:think has been nominated at Ecofalante Environmental Film Festival in the category "Best feature documentary on Economy".
The festival runs in 7 theaters in Sao Paulo from March 20th – 27th, and will be screening films within the categories; Cities, Countryside, Economy, Energy, People & Places, Water Day Special.
Planet RE:think is up against 5 strong documentaries including Blackfish, Redemption Impossible, Big Men, Cloudy Mountains and Gold Fever.
Either way, Planet RE:think is once again out there RE:thinking our Planet!
For more information, go to: http://www.ecofalante.org.br/mostra/filmes/detalhes/idf/24
3a Mostra Ecofalante de Cinema Ambiental – Vinheta from ESTÚDIO TEREMIM on Vimeo.


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Landcare Links
Connecting Community and Catchment
Annual Reports - Outcomes & Case Studies - Pest Plants and Animals
Browse All Publications
The creek and its associated floodplain and wetland support grey box-dominated grassy woodland communities and numerous threatened species including Murray cod, brolga and buloke.
The upper Broken Creek has been used for water supply from the Broken River for more than 100 years. It was supplied with flows from the Broken River for the Tungamah Domestic and Stock System and for irrigation supplied from the creek. In recent years, the Tungamah Domestic and Stock System has been pipelined and supplied from the Goulburn system, and the irrigation entitlements reduced by 80% as part of the Lake Mokoan decommissioning project. As a result, the creek now has relatively low flows all year round from Caseys Weir to Waggarandal Weir (supplying irrigation entitlements) and is ephemeral between Waggarandal Weir and Katamatite, with short duration fresh/high flow events occurring in response to catchment rainfall.
An environmental flows study for the Broken Creek was completed in 2007. The study identified the following priority watering actions:
To date environmental water has not been delivered down the upper Broken Creek due to the limited availability of environmental water in the system and creek capacity.
Click here to download information regarding watering actions for the Broken Catchment.
Any further information regarding proposed watering actions for the Upper Broken Creek can be obtained by contacting the GB CMA.
The Murray-Darling Freshwater Research Centre – Effects of decommissioning Lake Mokoan on fish community structure in the Broken River: One year progress report
To view photos of the Upper Broken Creek, visit our GB CMA Flickr page by clicking on the image below:
To view videos of the Upper Broken Creek, visit our GB CMA YouTube channel by clicking on the image below:


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Be Yourself – at your best
"At GWF we want you to 'be yourself – at your best'. We work in a tough industry and to be competitive, we need people to be at their best. We want to understand our people as individuals first, so we provide the right support, challenge, and stretch to help them be a success.
With businesses in the local region as well as globally, through our parent ABF in the UK, we have access to expertise and geographies across the world. This provides a wide range of choices for our people to progress their career and develop skills they may not usually access in a smaller business.
We take pride in the work we do and employ a diverse range of people with specialist and unique skills. As a daily fresh business, our people understand the importance of getting things right for our customers who depend on us. Driving performance and standards is key for our success. It's particularly important as we encourage an autonomous working model where people can create and deliver within their business, living our GWF values in a way that's authentic to them.
Diversity in our business is encouraged and recognised by our people as a way of delivering better outcomes. We welcome people who have different experiences and backgrounds, as they bring valuable perspectives and insights. GWF encourages applications from people with disability; and are committed to making reasonable workplace adjustments to provide a positive, barrier-free recruitment process and supportive workplace.
We are proud of our offer for our people and are continually looking for ways to improve it to better meet the needs of our people and the business. Here's some of what's on offer with a career at GWF and what we expect from our people!"
High challenge, high support
We need high levels of performance, so we place a high priority on you spending time with your leader to understand goals and what a successful outcome looks like. Regular performance conversations throughout the year ensure you remain on track to deliver your commitments. We identify high performers through our talent and succession processes, offering them challenging career opportunities.
Safety for everyone, everyday
Safety is our first priority and everyone is accountable. We expect you to act safely in everything you do, and speak up when you see a safety issue. What you walk past is what you accept and it takes real discipline and a 'can do' attitude to stop what you are doing and take action. We invest in a range of safety systems, tools, training and support to make sure we live up to our safety commitments. Our CEO and leadership team are strong role models with clear accountability in their KPI's to deliver on our safety targets.
Be the best you - developing your skills
We expect you'll look for ways to develop your skills and capabilities that align to both GWF's business priorities and your needs. We invest in your development, giving you regular feedback and coaching so you know what to work on and how you are progressing. We also provide training, tools and support along the way to help you get there. We want to understand your ambitions to focus on how we can develop you today in line with future aspirations.
Rewards for performance
In striving to achieve challenging goals, we want you to take pride in what you do and deliver results in a way that's aligned to GWF's values and behaviours. We offer competitive pay, and for certain roles, the added incentive of an annual bonus that rewards higher performance. Your leader will make decisions about your salary and bonus level based on your performance.
Great leaders create commitment and belief in their people to continue the business journey. We want our leaders to coach and deliver through their people, and that requires a balanced approach - growing both the business results and their people. We recognise that people typically join a company and then leave due to a poor relationship with a leader, so we hold our leaders accountable for their behaviours and how well they perform as a leader first. We use a range of ways to measure and develop our leaders so they can be at their best.
A simple thank you
We recognise people work extremely hard and that saying 'thank you' is a great way for them to feel good about what they are doing. We have a three tiered program that encourages everyone to thank their work mates, creating a culture where we appreciate each other and build collaboration. Leaders also have a key role in taking time out to celebrate within their teams, recognising people who have delivered great results in a way that role models our behaviours. Our CEO and leadership team also celebrate year end by identifying the 'best of the best' and recognising their valuable contributions.
Everyone counts
We ask you to speak up, share your views, and seek out the information you need to do your job effectively. We support our leaders to have honest and open conversations with you, sharing information that's relevant to your role. We have a range of ways to help you connect with people and the business in all parts of GWF and ABF.
Part of the community
We give you opportunities to contribute to the community through GWF's Foundation partners and encourage our people to give beyond the commercial outcomes of the business. These opportunities allow you to connect with the communities and individuals who are less fortunate than ourselves.


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Gautam Gambhir is an Indian cricketer, especially a left handed opening batsman and a right arm leg break bowler. He has been in the Indian national cricket team since 2003 in the ODIs and in the tests since 2004. At present, he has been bought by the Royal Challengers Bangalore team to play for the IPL 5 season.
In 2000, Gambhir was selected for the first intake of the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore. In domestic cricket, Gambhir had an average score of above 50 and his two consecutive double-hundreds in 2002, making him a strong contender for the opening slot in the Indian cricket team.
In 2003, Gambhir made his ODI debut against Bangladesh in the TVS Cup. In his third match, he was named 'Man of the Match' for scoring 71. In 2005, he scored his first century against Sri Lanka, during which he scored 103 runs in only 97 deliveries.
Gambhir's test debut came in 2004 in the fourth match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. In the second test against South Africa he scored 96. His first test century was against Bangladesh in December 2004. However, as he repeatedly struggled against Chaminda Vaas at home, he was dropped from the Test team. Gambhir is often blamed for not converting his starts of 20 or 30 into larger scores.
When Gambhir was out of the Test team, he played several ODIs for India from 2005 to 2007 but was not included in the 2007 Word Cup squad. However, for the Bangladesh tour of 2007, Gambhir scored his second century and was selected for the Ireland tour. In the very first match, he was awarded 'Man of the Match' for an unbeaten 80.


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Ísafjörður is a small fishing town in Iceland which recently became very popular thanks to their amazing idea. People of this town are dealing with the same traffic problems as anywhere else in this world. The only difference is the way they are dealing with those inattentive drivers. Their exciting development may have just revolutionized the entire area of road safety.
There are many ways to reduce speeding, but they are not so effective, to put it mildly. Town of Ísafjörður came up with a more cunning tactics and it seems to work like a charm. They invented a seemingly floating crosswalks! It's actually a a cleverly-detailed optical illusion. Pedestrian crossings have been painted so it seems like the zebra stripes are elevated. A 3D crosswalk – genius!
From driver's point of view, travelers look like are walking on air, and it gets their attention. They are sure to slow down when they stumble upon something like this.
I would love to see one of these in my city and how about you? Watch the video and tell us what you think about it.


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782 Pine Street
Bristol, CT 06010
(Near Route 72
and across from
Stop & Shop)
For Take Out Call:
The Oasis Restaurant has been family owned and operated for nearly 25 years at the same location. We believe our customers deserve freshly prepared food served by a friendly, courteous staff.
We welcome walk-in diners and will take reservations for larger parties. Plus, menu items and party platters are available for takeout. We have a full liquor service so customers can enjoy their favorite beer, wine, or cocktail with lunch or dinner.
Breakfast begins at 7 a.m. at The Oasis. We cook everything to order, including our fabulous breakfast special which is available Monday through Friday. There are many selections on the
menus. We have
weekend specials
. Your server will go over the daily specials, too.
Entrees include steak, pasta, chicken, veal, pork and seafood. Hamburger platters, appetizers, salads, pizzas and grinders also are available for lunch and dinner. Sandwiches, including club sandwiches, are available at lunchtime. The desserts are delicious and many pies and cakes are on display in the dining room showcase. For your convenience, our menus are available for viewing online or downloading and printing.
The banquet room at the Oasis offers privacy for many types of occasions. It is tastefully decorated, including chandeliers. It is an ideal location for showers, weddings, consolation meals, birthday and anniversary parties, and more. A
banquet menu
is available for buffet, pizza buffet, and breakfast brunch meals.
We Are Family Owned and Operated
We Are a Full Service Restaurant (No Fast Food Here)
We Serve Breakfast Daily from 7 a.m.
We Use Only Fresh Ingredients
We Have a Full Liquor Service
We Have Plenty of Safe, Free Parking Right at the Door
Copyright 2010 - 2020 by The Oasis Restaurant
About Oasis
Breakfast Menu
Lunch Menu
Dinner Menu
Banquet Menu
Party Platters
Baklava Is One of the Freshly Made Desserts
Sold at The Oasis
Our private banquet room at
the Oasis Restaurant in
Bristol, Connecticut is
the ideal place for your
next occasion.
Please take a look at our
Banquet Menu.
We're Going to Celebrate 25 Years in Business in the Coming Year
Delicious Food and Well Liked Wait Staff ~ Call Us at 860-585-9393
Breakfast Lunch Dinner Banquet Facilities
A Full Line of Liquor Including Cocktails, a Selection of Wine, and Beer
The families of Andy and Bill and the entire staff of Oasis Restaurant would like to thank the Bristol community. We are going to celebrate 25 years in business in the coming year.
Go to
Since 1990
Website Designed
Design a Website
List Your Business


text:
Movie Trailers
Watch: First Clip From Steven Knight's LOCKE, Starring Tom Hardy
It's not like you're going to see something spectacular from this first Locke clip, but I'm sure that Tom Hardy's fans will have nothing against this short video. In case you forgot, we're talking about Steven Knight's upcoming real-time thriller which stars Hardy as a guy whose life is unraveling right after he recieves a strange phone call. Head inside to take a look…
Written and directed by Knight, this drama thriller will tell us the story of a man named Ivan Locke whose life is unraveling in a tension-fuelled ninety minute race against time.
In other words, Hardy plays Ivan Locke, who has the perfect family, his dream job, and… well almost the perfect life. But one phone call will force him to make a decision that will put it all on the line.
Described as a unique cinematic experience that literally puts the audience in the passenger's seat to watch the driver's life unfold, Locke is scheduled to be shown out of competition at the 70th Venice International Film Festival.
Beside Hardy, Locke also stars Tom Holland, Olivia Colman, Andrew Scott and Ruth Wilson.
Here's the official synopsis:
Ivan Locke has worked hard to craft a good life for himself. Tonight, that life will collapse around him. On the eve of the biggest challenge of his career, Ivan receives a phone call that sets in motion a series of events that will unravel his family, job, and soul.
And, here's the clip and Knight's statement:
It was a joy and challenge to make Locke in an entirely different way. Shot in real time, Locke breaks new ground in movie making with Hardy holding the screen alone while the camera never blinks. The night time highway is part back drop, part art installation, as a stellar cast play the people Ivan loves and hates and who witness his extraordinary journey to despair and ultimately to redemption. A man's life transformed in a half a tank of gas. I believe the journey of Ivan Locke is deeply moving and utterly compulsive.


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John Wanamaker Store
The Grand Court
|1300 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19107
|39°57′5.98″N 75°9′43.81″W / 39.9516611°N 75.1621694°WCoordinates: 39°57′5.98″N 75°9′43.81″W / 39.9516611°N 75.1621694°W
|Thompson, Starrett Co.; Daniel Burnham
|Architectural style
|NRHP reference #
|Significant dates
|Added to NRHP
|June 2, 1978[2]
|Designated NHL
|June 2, 1978
John Wanamaker Department Store was one of the first department stores in the United States. Founded by John Wanamaker, it is known for its substantial effects on the development of the retail industry, such as being the first store to use price tags. At its zenith in the early 20th century, Wanamaker's also had a store in New York City at Broadway and Ninth Street. Both employed extremely large staffs. By the end of the 20th century, there were 16 Wanamaker's outlets, but after years of change the chain was bought by Albert Taubman,[3] and added to his previous purchase of Woodward & Lothrop, the Washington, D.C., department store. In 1994, Woodies, as it was known, filed for bankruptcy. The assets of Woodies were purchased by the May Company Department Stores and JCPenney. In 1995, Wanamakers transitioned to Hecht's, one of the May Company brands.[4] In 2006, Macy's Center City became the occupant of the former Philadelphia Wanamaker's Department Store, which is now a National Historic Landmark.
John Wanamaker was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1838. Due to a persistent cough, he was unable to join the U.S. Army to fight in the American Civil War, so instead started a career in business. In 1861, he and his brother-in-law Nathan Brown founded a men's clothing store in Philadelphia called Oak Hall. Wanamaker carried on the business alone after Brown's death in 1868. Eight years later, Wanamaker purchased the abandoned Pennsylvania Railroad station for use as a new, larger retail location. The concept was to renovate the terminal into a "Grand Depot" similar to London's Royal Exchange or Paris's Les Halles—two central markets, and forerunners of the modern department store, that were well known in Europe at that time.
The Wanamaker's Grand Depot opened in time to service the public visiting Philadelphia for the American Centennial Exposition of 1876, and in fact resembled one of the many pavilions at that world's fair because of its fanciful new Moorish facade. In 1877 the interior of Wanamaker's was refurbished and expanded to include not only men's clothing, but women's clothing and dry goods as well. This was Philadelphia's first modern-day department store, and one of the earliest founded in America. A circular counter was placed at the center of the building, and concentric circles radiated around it with 129 counters of goods. The store also accepted mail orders, though it was not a large business until the early twentieth century.[5]
Enlightened retailing[edit]
Wanamaker first thought of how he would run a store on new principles when, as a youth, a merchant refused his request to exchange a purchase. A practicing Christian, he chose not to advertise on Sundays. Before he opened his Grand Depot for retail business, he let evangelist Dwight L. Moody use its facilities as a meeting place, while Wanamaker provided 300 ushers from his store personnel. His retail advertisements—the first to be copyrighted beginning in 1874—were factual, and promises made in them were kept.[citation needed]
Wanamaker guaranteed the quality of his merchandise in print,[citation needed] allowed his customers to return purchases for a cash refund and offered the first restaurant to be located inside a department store. Wanamaker also invented the price tag.[6]
His employees were to be treated respectfully by management (including not being scolded in public), and John Wanamaker & Company offered its employees access to the John Wanamaker Commercial Institute, as well as free medical care, recreational facilities, profit sharing plans, and pensions—long before these types of benefits were considered standard in corporate employment.
Innovation and "firsts" marked Wanamaker's. The store was the first department store with electrical illumination (1878), first store with a telephone (1879), and the first store to install pneumatic tubes to transport cash and documents (1880).
Wanamaker's commissioned a Philadelphia/New Jersey artist, George Washington Nicholson (1832–1912), to paint a large landscape mural, "The Old Homestead", which was finished in March 1892. The 7-by-14-foot (2.1 by 4.3 m) mural was still owned by Wanamaker's in 1950, but has since passed into a private collection.
In 1910, Wanamaker replaced his Grand Depot in stages, and constructed a new, purpose-built structure on the same site in Center City Philadelphia. The new store, built in the Florentine style with granite walls by Chicago architect Daniel H. Burnham, had 12 floors (nine for retail), numerous galleries and two lower levels totaling nearly two million square feet. The palatial emporium featured the Wanamaker Organ, the former St. Louis World's Fair pipe organ, at the time one of the world's largest organs. The organ was installed in the store's marble-clad central atrium known as the Grand Court. Another item from the St. Louis Fair in the Grand Court is the large bronze eagle, which quickly became the symbol of the store and a favorite meeting place for shoppers. All one had to say was "Meet You at The Eagle" and everyone knew where to go. The store was dedicated by President William Howard Taft on December 13, 1911.
Despite its size, the organ was deemed insufficient to fill the Grand Court with its music. Wanamaker's responded by assembling its own staff of organ builders and expanding the organ several times over a period of years. The "Wanamaker Organ" is the largest fully operational pipe organ in the world, with some 28,750 pipes. It is famed for the delicate, orchestra-like beauty of its tone as well as its incredible power. The organ still stands in place in the store today and free recitals are held twice every day except Sunday. Visitors are also invited to tour the organ's console area and meet with staff after recitals.[7] Once a year, usually in June, "Wanamaker Organ Day" is held, which is a free recital which lasts most of the day.
News of the Titanic's sinking was transmitted to Wanamaker's wireless station in New York City, and given to anxious crowds waiting outside—yet another first for an American retail store. Public Christmas Caroling in the store's Grand Court began in 1918.
Other innovations included employing buyers to travel overseas to Europe each year for the latest fashions, the first White sale (1878) and other themed sales such as the February "Opportunity Sales" to keep prices as low as possible while keeping volume high. The store also broadcast its organ concerts on the Wanamaker-owned radio station WOO beginning in 1922. Under the leadership of James Bayard Woodford, Wanamaker's opened piano stores in Philadelphia and New York that did a huge business with an innovative fixed-price system of sales. Salons in period decor were used to sell the higher-price items. Wanamaker also tried selling small organs built by the Austin Organ Company for a time.
Slow decline[edit]
After John Wanamaker's death in 1922 the business carried on under Wanamaker family ownership. Rodman Wanamaker, John's son, enhanced the reputation of the stores as artistic centers and temples of the beautiful, offering imported luxuries from around the world. He died shortly before the Great Depression, and after his death in 1928, the stores (managed for the family by a trust) continued to thrive for a time. The men's clothing and accessories department was expanded into its own separate store on the lower floors of the Lincoln-Liberty Building, two doors down on Chestnut Street, in 1932. This building, which also had a private apartment for the Wanamaker family on its top floor, was sold to Philadelphia National Bank in 1952; the initials on the building's crown read "PNB" until November 2014, even though the bank no longer existed[8] (PNB was acquired by CoreStates, which was then acquired by First Union, which was rebranded as Wachovia Bank after acquiring Wachovia Corporation, and later acquired by Wells Fargo & Co.). Over time, Wanamaker's lost business to other retail chains, including Bloomingdale's and Macy's, in the Philadelphia market. The Wanamaker Family Trust finally sold John Wanamaker and Company, with its underpatronized stores, to Los Angeles, California-based Carter Hawley Hale Stores for US$60 million cash in 1978.[citation needed] Carter Hawley Hale poured another $80 million into renovating the stores,[citation needed] but to no avail—customers had gone elsewhere in the intervening decades and did not come back.
Later Innovations[edit]
Finally, in 1986, the now 15-store chain was sold to Woodward & Lothrop, owned by Detroit shopping-mall magnate A. Alfred Taubman. Taubman reorganized the business with a shortened corporate name (Wanamaker's Inc.), and poured millions more into store renovations and public relations campaigns. This too was no help, as Taubman's retail interests were heavily in debt and the stores' combined sales were a disappointment. Believing that the Wanamaker Building space was more valuable than portions of the historic Wanamaker store, the Philadelphia flagship store was reduced to its first five stories, the Juniper Street side became the lobby of an office building for the upper stories, and the former basement budget "Downstairs Store" became a parking garage. The Crystal Tea Room restaurant was closed and eventually leased to the Marriott Corporation for use as a ballroom. Personal effects of Mr. Wanamaker from his until-then preserved office on the eighth floor, and the store archives, were donated to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Beloved huge Easter paintings of the trial and Passion of the Christ by Mihály Munkácsy that had been personal favorites of Mr. Wanamaker and were displayed every year in the Grand Court during Lent were unceremoniously sold at auction.
Woodward & Lothrop collapsed in bankruptcy, filing for Chapter 11 on January 17, 1994, and with it the Wanamaker stores, which were sold to May Department Stores Company on June 21, 1995. Wanamaker's Inc. was formally dissolved, and operations were consolidated with May's Hecht's division in Arlington, Virginia. After 133 consecutive years, the Wanamaker's name was removed from all stores and replaced with Hecht's. In 1997, May acquired Wanamaker's historic rival Strawbridge & Clothier and re-branded all Philadelphia-area Hecht's locations with the Strawbridge's name. The Center City Hecht's (temporarily named Strawbridge's) was closed for a lengthy renovation and refurbishment that saw the former Wanamaker retail space reduced in size again to three floors, and the former selling floors on the upper floors further subdivided into commercial office space. This was to prepare the way, in 1997, for New York-based Lord & Taylor, another division of May Department Stores, to open in the former Wanamaker's flagship in Center City Philadelphia. In August 2006 the store was converted to Macy's, operated by the Macy's East Division of Federated Department Stores Inc., (now Macy's Inc.), which acquired May in late 2005. The New York Wanamaker's store on Broadway was replaced by Kmart by 1996.
The store was not immune to the major change in retailing away from regional chains to national chains. The uniformity of brand offerings and the cost savings available to national chains all worked against the viability of the store as an independent personality, although customers generally had a major say in determining store offerings and the magnificence of its commercial space did tend to cause it to be stocked with better offerings. Other retailers had also learned to offer goods with much smaller staff rosters. The ability of retailers to "go national" in opposition to regional tastes is still an experiment-in-progress with mixed results.
The Wanamaker's flagship store, with its famous organ and eagle from the St. Louis World's Fair, was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1978. Retailers continue to reap significant monetary returns from the elegance of this unparalleled retail space. In 1992, a nonprofit group, the Friends of the Wanamaker Organ, was founded to promote the preservation, restoration and presentation of the famous pipe organ.[9]
As a retail site, the Philadelphia flagship store has proved quite profitable for later tenants Lord & Taylor and now Macy's. With a long tradition of parades and fireworks displays, Macy's has taken a prominent civic role in fostering historic Wanamaker traditions, especially the Wanamaker Organ and the Holiday Pageant of Lights Christmas Show. In 2008, Macy's celebrated its 150th birthday in the Philadelphia flagship store with a concert featuring the Wanamaker Organ and the Philadelphia Orchestra that attracted a capacity audience.
Christmas Light Show[edit]
In 1956, the Philadelphia Wanamaker's premiered a Christmas Light Show, a large musical and blinking light display several stories high, viewable from several levels of the building, but with the best viewing on the central ground floor. Its popularity with Philadelphia parents and children, as well as tourists, ensured a continuous run, even after the building was sold to different business interests.
For decades until 1994, the melodic baritone "voice", or narrator, of the show was John Facenda, known to Philadelphians for decades reporting the news on radio and television, as well as nationally known as the voice of NFL Films. NFL Films' Ed Sabol referred to Facenda as "The Voice of God" (Facenda is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio). His wordsmithing and dramatic baritone delivery were highlights of the shows and did much to boost Facenda's stock and mystique. Various announcers narrated the show between 1995 and 2005. Beginning in 2006, under Macy's, Julie Andrews became the show's narrator. Also in 2006, the Santa Express Train at the top of the Grand Court returned.
In 2007, the entire Christmas Light Show was completely modernized and rebuilt by Macy's Parade Studio on new trusses with lighter materials and LED lighting. In 2008, a new and bigger Magic Christmas Tree with LED lights debuted. However, due to safety concerns and logistical issues, the dancing water fountains were retired and will not return.[10]
Floor setup[edit]
- Ground floor: 2,500-pound brass-like Durana metal eagle statue in the Grand Court, made by German sculptor August Gaul for the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exhibition and purchased by John Wanamaker; for many decades, Philadelphians would agree to "meet me at the eagle" (at Wanamaker's).[11]
- 3rd floor: Egyptian Hall auditorium behind the executive offices, also a Greek Hall auditorium. The architecture of Egyptian Hall is presently (2008) obscured by the Executive Offices and Dickens Christmas Village.
- 8th floor: toy department had a monorail for the kids that traveled around the entire department, camera dept, piano and organ dept. The monorail car is a feature at Philadelphia's Please Touch Museum.
- 9th floor: Crystal Tea Room
- 10th floor: in-house physician and nurses
- 12th floor: Wanamaker Organ Shop, where the Wanamaker Organ was enlarged by an in-house expert staff
- Sub-floors: the Downstairs Store, post office, lost and found, shoe repair, the Dairy restaurant. This area became a parking garage.
- Radio broadcasting station
- Model house on the furniture floor
- Home of the world's largest playable pipe organ
Crystal Tea Room[edit]
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Wanamaker's also was home to the Crystal Tea Room restaurant on the 9th floor, which closed to the public in 1995; it was restored as a private banquet hall, accommodating sit-down receptions of up to 1,000 people. A Wanamaker's guidebook from the 1920s states that the Crystal Tea Room was the largest dining room in Philadelphia, and one of the largest in the world. It once could serve 1,400 people at a time. It served breakfast in the morning, luncheon, and afternoon tea. The kitchen's big ovens could roast 75 turkeys at a time and the facility was equipped with lockers and baths for the employees. In acknowledgment of John Wanamaker's promotion of temperance causes, alcohol was not served in the Tea Room until after the family trust sold the store. There was informal modeling in the Tea Room.
There is also a balcony cafe, the Terrace on the Court, on the third floor facing the Grand Court, where shoppers could hear the Wanamaker Organ as they dined. Macy's closed this restaurant in 2008.
In popular culture[edit]
- Scenes in the 1981 film Blow Out were filmed outside Wanamaker's.[12]
- Much of the 1987 movie Mannequin was filmed at Wanamaker's,[13][14] as was the 1991 sequel, Mannequin Two: On the Move.[15]
- The 1995 film 12 Monkeys features multiple scenes inside the Grand Court of Wanamaker's and a lengthy scene outside on the sidewalk.
- In the "Moe n' Joe" episode of The Sopranos, Johnny Sack mentions that he met his wife Ginny at Wanamaker's, where she worked behind the tie counter.
See also[edit]
- Wanamaker Mile
- Millrose Games
- Wanamaker Trophy for golf's PGA Champion
- Please Touch Museum (Wanamaker's Rocket Monorail)
- List of National Historic Landmarks in Philadelphia
- National Register of Historic Places listings in Center City, Philadelphia
- ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. January 23, 2007.
- ^ Listing of John Wanamaker Store at the National Park Service
- ^ Kelly, john. "New book details the history of Woodward & Lothrop, a vanished D.C. department store". The Washington Post. Retrieved 15 May 2015.
- ^ Jackson, Kimberlly L. (September 4, 1995). "Wanamakers' Faithful Flock To Hecht's Department Store Begins Its Two-month Transition". The Morning Call. Retrieved 15 May 2015.
- ^ https://archive.org/stream/goldenbookofwana00wana#page/n13/mode/2up pg. 48
- ^ "Who Made America? | Innovators | John Wanamaker". www.pbs.org.
- ^ Friends of the Wanamaker Organ schedule for recitals Retrieved 2010-12-24
- ^ Melamed, Samantha. "Skyline changes: PNB letters removed by 'copter from atop 1 S. Broad". philly.com. The Philadelphia Inquirer. Retrieved November 17, 2014.
- ^ "Friends of the Wanamaker Organ, Inc".
- ^ http://www.wanamakerorgan.com/xmas.php Friends of the Wanamaker Organ website.
- ^ "Wanamaker Eagle".
- ^ "Filming Locations for Blow Out (1981)". The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations.
- ^ "Why Mannequin Is the Best Movie Ever Made About Philadelphia". December 4, 2013.
- ^ Call, The Morning. "MOVIE WILL BE FILMED AT WANAMAKER'S IN PHILA. BRIEFLY". themorningcall.com.
- ^ https://www.metro.us/philadelphia/phillywood-7-key-sites-in-philly-movie-history/zsJpgs---2O4sNq7hHpijM
Further reading[edit]
- Herbert Ershkowitz John Wanamaker: Philadelphia Merchant (Signpost Biographies-Da Capo Press (May 21, 1999))
- Robert Sobel The Entrepreneurs: Explorations Within the American Business Tradition (Weybright & Talley 1974), chapter 3, John Wanamaker: The Triumph of Content Over Form ISBN 0-679-40064-8
- Wanamaker's: Meet Me at the Eagle. The History Press. 2010. ISBN 978-1-62619-068-9.
External links[edit]
This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. (August 2018) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Wanamaker's.
- John Wanamaker's role in providing the Grand Depot for Christian evangelist D. L. Moody's revival meetings
- About May - Company History
- Crystal Tea Room today
- Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) No. PA-1692, "John Wanamaker Store", 2 photos, 2 photo caption pages
- A history of the Christmas Light Show
- A history of the Wanamaker Organ
- Video Clip 1991
- Video Clip 1995
- Capano ownership of old Wanamaker bldg
- The John Wanamaker Collection, 1827-1987, including an extensive collection of correspondence, accounts, scrapbooks, legal papers, photographs and other materials which detail the history of Wanamaker's store, is available for research use at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
- George Washington Nicholson, painter of "The Old Homestead," which hung at Wanamaker's store from 1892 until at least 1950
- Companies established in 1861
- Defunct department stores of the United States
- Historic American Buildings Survey in Philadelphia
- History of Philadelphia
- National Historic Landmarks in Pennsylvania
- Commercial buildings completed in 1902
- Retail companies disestablished in 1996
- Market East, Philadelphia
- 1861 establishments in Pennsylvania
- National Register of Historic Places in Philadelphia
- May Department Stores
- Wanamaker family


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Load-Bearing Communications
Communication is a huge part of the support system for a construction crew. Everyone needs to be able to communicate seamlessly with one another to stay on task and aware of any critical situations. Our rugged two-way radios will not only be able to handle your communication needs, but they will be able to withstand the tough conditions of the job site and the abuse that a hands-on job can put on equipment. We also have vehicle radios that can be put into your fleet for communication on the go!
Our communication solutions will keep your scattered workforce all on the same page, improving efficiency and work place safety. Saving you time and money, all while keeping your employees informed and ready for the next task.