The prosecutor in criminal cases in Canada is commonly referred to as the Crown, since the prosecution is carried out in the name of Her Majesty.
The title of Leon Uris’ novel QB VII means “Queen’s Bench, Courtroom Seven”, the site of the libel trial at its narrative heart. The plaintiff, a doctor who worked in a Nazi concentration camp, wins the case but only a half penny in damages, against the reporter who wrote that he was actually an enthusiastic collaborator in their “experiments”.
The novel is loosely based on a libel action brought against Uris himself by Dr. Wladislaw Dering, a Polish physician who worked at Auschwitz, in relation to his previous novel Exodus, which resulted in Dr. Dering being awarded a half-penny damages, the smallest possible amount at the time.
Auschwitz, now in Oświęcim, Oświęcim County, Poland, is roughly equidistant from Warsaw, Bratislava, and Budapest. It is also roughly equidistant from Prague and Lviv.
Triple Crown winner Secretariat had a foal by Filly Triple Crown winner Chris Evert; the result was named “Six Crowns.” And, yes, Chris Evert was named after the tennis champion; it’s acceptable to name a thoroughbred after a living person if that person gives permission.
Secretariat’s Kentucky Derby record is remarkable. Not only had no horse won in under two minutes before, but his successive quarter mile times were 25-1⁄5, 24, 23-4⁄5, 23-2⁄5, and 23 seconds.
This means he was accelerating throughout the entire race, and he was still accelerating as of the final quarter-mile of the race.
The premier thoroughbred horse race in Australia is the Melbourne Cup, which is run on the first Tuesday in November every year. The distance is 3,200m.
The shortest odds winner was *Phar Lap *in 1930 at odds of 8 to 11.
There have been three horses that have won at the longest odds of 100 to 1: *The Pearl *in 1871, *Wotan *in 1936 and *Old Rowley *in 1940.
California Chrome missed being the first US Triple Crown winner in 35 years when he lost in this year’s Belmont Stakes to Tonalist. California Chrome was the 13th “near miss” of the Triple Crown since the last Triple Crown winner, Affirmed in 1978; the near misses were winners of the first two legs of the Triple Crown.
Of those 13 near misses, Big Brown in 2008 was the only one to be eased. Officially, Big Brown was a DNF, did not finish, in that Belmont Stakes. There were 9 horses in that field.
Of those 13 near misses, I’ll Have Another in 2012 was the only one to be scratched before the race.
Here are the 13 near miss horses, and how they finished in the Belmont, and the Belmont winner:
2014: CALIFORNIA CHROME (4th; Tonalist)
2012: I’LL HAVE ANOTHER (scratched; Union Rags)
2008: BIG BROWN (last, 9th; Da’Tara. Was eased, officially a DNF)
2004: SMARTY JONES (2nd; Birdstone)
2003: FUNNY CIDE (3rd; Empire Maker)
2002: WAR EMBLEM (7th; Sarava)
1999: CHARISMATIC (3rd; Lemon Drop Kid)
1998: REAL QUIET (2nd; Victory Gallop)
1997: SILVER CHARM (2nd; Touch Gold)
1989: SUNDAY SILENCE (2nd; Easy Goer)
1987: ALYSHEBA (4th; Bet Twice)
1981: PLEASANT COLONY (3rd; Summing)
1979: SPECTACULAR BID (3rd; Coastal)
Belmont is a suburb located on the shore of Lake Macquarie, about 20km from the city of Newcastle in NSW.
Mrs MacQuarie’s chair is a bench carved into a sandstone outcropping, overlooking Sydney Harbour. It is said to have been carved by convict labour on the instructions of Governor MacQuarie, to give his wife a place to sit and watch the ships in the harbour.
Mrs Macquarie’s chair is across the harbour from the suburb of Kirribilli, where both Kirribilli House (the Sydney residence of the Prime Minister) and Admiralty House (the Sydney residence of the Governor-General) are located.
The coldest temperature recorded in Sydney, according to weatherbase.com, was 32 °F, on one brutally cold July winter’s day.
That figure is not consistent with the lowest minimum recorded temperature for Sydney according to the records of the Bureau of Meteorology. It gives the record low for Sydney as 2.1C (35.8F) on 22 June 1932. So Sydney has never officially recorded a sub-zero temperature. The official gauge for Sydney is on Observatory Hill, right bedside the Harbour Bridge and close to the water. I think the possibility of ever getting a sub-zero temperature is pretty slim.
However the suburbs further inland often experience negative minima during winter.
And continuing with the cold weather theme: the coldest temperature ever recorded in Australia is -23.0C (-9.4F) on 29 June 1994 at Charlotte Pass, NSW.
Hawaii is the only USA state to have never recorded a temperature as cold as 0°F. Hawaii’s coldest recorded temperature is 12°F, atop Mauna Kea, whose elevation is 13,803 ft (4,207 m).
Mauna Kea is the world’s tallest mountain, measured from its base at the seabed. The *highest *mountain, measured from sea level, is Everest/Chomolungma (“Mother Goddess of the World”), while the highest measured from the center of the earth is Chimborazo.
The Chrysler Building in New York City was the tallest building in the world for one year, 1930 when it was completed, until the next year when the Empire State Building was completed.
The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, an organization that certifies buildings as the “World’s Tallest”, recognizes a building only if at least fifty percent of its height is made up of floor plates containing habitable floor area. Structures that do not meet this criterion, such as the CN Tower, are defined as “towers”.
The Freedom Tower of One World Trade Center became NYC’s tallest tower and the fourth largest tower in the world when it topped out on August 30, 2012.
The Tower Treasure was the first of the many Hardy Boys series of novels, originally published in 1927.
The Tower of the Americas in San Antonio TX was the tallest observation tower in the United States from 1968 until 1996, when the Las Vegas Stratosphere Tower was completed. It is the tallest building in San Antonio, the 27th tallest building in Texas, and the tallest building in Texas outside of Dallas or Houston.
Martello Towers are small defensive forts that were built across the British Empire during the 19th century, from the time of the French Revolutionary Wars onwards.
The last to be constructed was Fort Denison, in Sydney Harbour.