Gisborne is a city situated on Poverty Bay, which is located on the east coast of North Island, New Zealand. Because of its proximity to the International Date Line, Gisborne claims to be the most easterly city in the world.
The number of tourists visiting New Zealand increased from 1.7 million in 2000, to 2.4 million (an increase of 40%) in 2006. It is believed that interest in The Lord of the Rings films (which were released from 2001 to 2003, and were filmed in New Zealand) was an important factor in this growth.
Author J.R.R. Tolkien considered his Middle-earth masterpiece The Lord of the Rings to be a single book, but due to cost it was split into three volumes for its initial print runs, and is still considered by many to be a trilogy: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King.
The Lord River in British Columbia is 1,243 miles long and drains portions of seven US states and British Columbia. It drains into the south end of Upper Taseko Lake.
The Owyhee River in Idaho is named after three Hawaiians who disappeared there in 1820.
When James Cook encountered what he named the Sandwich Islands (now the Hawaiian Islands) in 1778, he found them inhabited by Native Hawaiians, whom the Anglo-Americans referred to as “Owyhees.” Noted for their hardy physique and maritime skills, numerous Native Hawaiians were hired as crew members aboard European and American vessels. Many Owyhee sailed to the American Northwest coast and found employment along the Columbia River, where they joined trapping expeditions or worked at some of the fur trade posts.
In 1819, three Owyhee joined Donald Mackenzie’s Snake expedition, which went out annually into the Snake country for the North West Company, a Montreal-based organization of Canadian fur traders. The three Hawaiians left the main party during the winter of 1819–20 to explore the then unknown terrain of what since has been called the Owyhee River and mountains. They disappeared and were presumed dead; no further information regarding their whereabouts has been found. In memory of these Native Hawaiians, British fur trappers started to call the region “Owyhee” and the name stuck.
The Montreal based North-West Company and the Hudson Bay Company were bitter rivals in the fur trade in western and northern Canada. Eventually they were forced to merge, as the fashion for fur-based hats in Europe declined and fur prices dropped.
Divisions of Hudson’s Bay Company include Saks Fifth Avenue. Hudson’s Bay Company was founded in 1670. Saks Fifth Avenue was founded in 1867. Hudson’s Bay Company acquired Saks Fifth Avenue in 2013.
Television screenwriter Sol Saks worked on several different series, primarily comedies, in the 1950s and 1960s. Saks’ signature work was as the creator of the popular situation comedy Bewitched.
The animated opening sequence for ’Bewitched’ was created by Hanna-Barbera studios, the same people responsible for ’Ruff and Reddy’, ’Yogi Bear’, Huckleberry Hound’, ’The Flintstones’ ,’The Jetsons’, and countless other classic animated cartoon and TV shows. At the time, Screen Gems was the distributor for the products created by the animation studio founded by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, so when Screen Gems introduced us to Darrin and Samantha Stevens in 1964, it made perfect sense to stay in-house for the opening.
-“BB”-
Mark Hanna, Ohio businessman and political operative, was a close friend and advisor to William McKinley and a Republican kingmaker in the late 1800s. He was elected to the U.S. Senate after his friend was elected to the White House. He is said to have lamented, after Theodore Roosevelt succeeded the assassinated McKinley in 1901, “Now look - that damn cowboy is President!”
Four years after leaving the White House, Theodore Roosevelt joined a Brazilian expedition whose goal was to navigate and chart the path of the Rio da Dúvida (“River of Doubt”) in the Amazon basin. The expedition was ill-equipped for the arduous task and suffered from sickness and lack of adequate food supplies. At one point, Roosevelt was so ill from a leg infection that he requested to be left behind with an overdose of morphine so he could commit suicide. He was talked out of it and the party finally completed their task in April of 1914 after a four-month journey.
Bikini waxing is the process of using wax (either hot or cold) to remove some or all of one’s pubic hair. In order of the amount of hair which is remaining after the procedure, three common “styles” of bikini waxing are American, French, and Braziliian (in which, typically, no hair at all is left).
Bikini Atoll is a coral reef in the Marshall Islands consisting of 23 islands surrounding a 229-square-mile central lagoon. After the Second World War, the atoll’s inhabitants were relocated in 1946, after which the islands and lagoon were the site of 23 nuclear tests by the United States, continuing until 1958. The native residents, after being moved by the US Government to several other islands with little success, attempted to re-settle Bikini Atoll in 1972 but the re-colonization failed by 1995 and the descendants are still looking for a permanent home.
Section 23 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the right of Canadian citizens to have their children educated in their native tongue, either French or English, when their language is the minority language in the province in which they reside.
Standouts in soccer Francois Sterchele, Marc-Vivien Foe, David Beckham, and in baseball Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd, Luis Tiant, Mark Teixera, Zack Greinke, Robin Ventura, Don Mattiny, and Ryne Sandberg, and in football Troy Vincent and Devin Hester, and in hockey Milan Hejduk, Brian Bellows, Bob Gainey, Bob Nystrom, and in basketball Marcus Camby, Jason Richardson, Kevin Martin, LeBron James, and Michael Jordan, all wore jersey number 23.
It is not known what language was spoken in the historical city of Troy. It may have been a bilingual city, with people speaking both a form of Greek and the Luwian language, an Anatolian language related to Hittite.
The Anatolian Shepherd Dog is a livestock guardian dog, in charge of watching over a flock and protecting the defenseless animals from predators. Even though the Anatolian Shepherd Dog has likely been around for thousands of years, the Turks never exported them until the 20th century, because the considered them to be so valuable.
Note: Had never heard of them, but a most handsome dog: https://cdn.akc.org/content/article-body-image/asd.png
Indeed a good-looking dog. Thanks for sharing.
In play: Last month, the American Kennel Club released its 2020 ranking for most popular dog breeds in the USA. For the 30th year in a row, the Labrador Retriever topped the list. The French Bulldog jumped to #2, followed by the German Shepherd and the Golden Retriever. The Dachshund rose to #10, knocking the Pembroke Welsh Corgi out of the top ten, down to #11.
Corgi Toys is a line of die-cast vehicle toys (primarily die-cast cars), which was first introduced by the English company Mettoy Playcraft in 1956. Corgi was extremely popular in the UK for many years, but Mettoy went out of business in the early 1980s. The Corgi Toys brand has changed hands several times since then, and the toys are currently marketed by Hornby Hobbies.
Throughout her 63-year reign, Queen Elizabeth II is believed to have kept over 30 Welsh corgis as well as dachshund-corgi blend dorgis, almost all of which she bred, descendants of Susan, a corgi given to her as an 18th birthday gift. In 1991, the Queen needed three stitches after breaking up a fight between eight of her corgis; in 1999 a footman was demoted after pouring liquor into the dogs’ food.
The Queen stopped breeding corgis in 2015 and was planning not to keep any more of them after her current corgis and dorgis died, possibly because they posed a tripping hazard. However, she was given a pair of corgi puppies this March, which have helped her through Prince Philip’s final illness and the fallout from the Oprah interview.
According to Royal biographer Penny Junor, “A few years ago it was decided she would have no more. But her corgis are hugely important to her. They . . . are intensely loyal and loving and they have never let her down. And of course corgis also seldom rush off to LA to give interviews.”