American Cream Draft

The American Cream Draft is the only draft horse breed developed in the United States that is still in existence. A rare horse breed today, it is recognized by its cream color, known as "gold champagne", produced by the action of the champagne gene upon a chestnut base color, and by its amber eyes, also characteristic of the gene; the only other color found in the breed is chestnut. Like several other breeds of draft horses, the American Cream is at risk for the autosomal recessive genetic disease junctional epidermolysis bullosa.
The breed was developed in Iowa during the early 20th century, beginning with a cream-colored mare named Old Granny. The Great Depression threatened the breed's existence, but several breeders worked to improve the color and type of the breed, and in 1944 a breed registry was formed. The mechanization of farming in the mid-20th century led to a decrease in the breed's population and the registry became inactive for several decades. It was reactivated in 1982 and population numbers have slowly grown since then. However, population numbers are still considered critical by The Livestock Conservancy and the Equus Survival Trust.
Characteristics.
American Creams have refined heads, with flat facial profiles that are neither concave nor convex. They have wide chests, sloping shoulders and short, strong backs. Their ribs are well sprung, and they are short-coupled with well-muscled hindquarters and with strong well-proportioned legs set well apart. They are sure-footed with strong hooves, and their movement is free and easy. According to enthusiasts, the breed has a calm, willing temperament, particularly suited for owners who are new to handling draft horses. Mares stand high and weigh , while stallions and geldings stand and weigh or more.
The ideal coat color for the breed is a medium cream with pink skin, amber eyes and a white mane and tail. The characteristic cream color of the breed is produced by the champagne gene. Recognized colors include light, medium and dark cream, with amber or hazel eyes. A cream mare with dark skin and a light mane and tail may be accepted by the registry as foundation stock, while stallions must have pink skin and white manes and tails to be registered. Purebred American Cream foals that are too dark to be accepted into the main breed registry may be recorded into an appendix registry. The appendix will also accept half-bred Cream Draft horses crossed with other draft bloodlines if they meet certain requirements, and the registry provides an upgrade system that uses appendix horses to strengthen genes, increase breed numbers, and allow more diversified bloodlines.
Color genetics.
The champagne gene produces diluted color, and the gold champagne body color, light skin, light eyes, and ivory mane and tail associated with the American Cream Draft are produced by the action of the champagne gene on a chestnut base coat. In the adult horse, the skin is pink with abundant dark freckles or mottling, and the eyes are hazel or amber. The eyes of champagne foals are blue at birth, darkening as they age, and a foal's skin is bright pink. The breed registry describes foals' eyes as "almost white", which is consistent with the nature of the champagne blue foal eye, which is creamier than other types of blue eye.
Champagne is a dominant trait, based on a mutation in the SLC36A1 gene. The mapping of the gene was announced in 2008, and the American Cream Draft cross was among the breeds studied. The authors of this study noted that it was difficult to distinguish between homozygous and heterozygous animals, thus distinguishing champagne from incomplete dominant dilutions such as the cream gene. However they noted that homozygotes may have less mottling or a slightly lighter hair color than heterozygotes. Anecdotal reports also note mild differences, including lighter freckling, skin and hair coat, though eye color remains the same.
Dark-skinned American Cream Draft horses are actually chestnuts, as the breed is not homozygous for the champagne gene; only one allele is needed to produce the proper color. Champagne dilutes any base coat color, and in the American Cream Draft, the underlying genetic base color is chestnut. As of 2003, scientists have not found the breed to carry the cream gene, even though breeders refer to the desired color as "cream". The American Cream Draft is never cremello or white, and though the gold coat color with a white mane and tail resembles palomino, the breed's defining characteristics are the result of the champagne gene.
Junctional epidermolysis bullosa.
The autosomal recessive genetic disease junctional epidermolysis bullosa (JEB) has been found in some American Cream Drafts. This is a lethal genetic disorder that causes newborn foals to lose large areas of skin and have other abnormalities, normally leading to euthanasia of the animal. It is most commonly associated with Belgian horses, but is also found in other draft breeds. A DNA test was developed in 2002, and JEB can be avoided as long as two carriers are not bred to one another. The American Cream registry states that it has "been pro-active in testing its registered animals since JEB was discovered".
Breed history.
The American Cream is the only breed of draft horse developed in the United States that is still in existence today. The breed descends from a foundation mare named Old Granny. She was probably foaled between 1900 and 1905, and was first noticed at an auction in Story County, Iowa, in 1911 and purchased by Harry Lakin, a well-known stock dealer. She was eventually sold to Nelson Brothers Farm in Jewell, Iowa. Her breeding is not known, but she was cream-colored and many of her foals were as well; they sold for above-average prices because of their color. Her cream-colored coat, pink skin and amber eyes are defining standards for the breed, and the color is now known as gold champagne. In 1946, two years after the breed registry was formed, 98 percent of the horses registered could be traced back to Old Granny.
In 1920, a colt of Old Granny's named Nelson's Buck No. 2 impressed veterinarian Eric Christian to the point that Christian asked the Nelsons not to geld him. They agreed to let him remain a stallion, and he sired several cream-colored foals, though only one was registered: a colt named Yancy No. 3, whose dam was a black mare of Percheron breeding. Yancy sired Knox 1st, born in 1926 to an unregistered bay mare of mixed Shire ancestry. From this sire line, in 1931, a great-great-grandson of Nelson's Buck was born, named Silver Lace No. 9. Silver Lace was to become one of the most influential stallions of the American Cream breed. His dam was a Belgian mare with light chestnut coloring, and she is credited with Silver Lace's size – at he weighed considerably more than most of his bloodline. Silver Lace quickly became a popular stallion in Iowa. However, stallions standing for public stud service in Iowa were required to be registered with the Iowa Department of Agriculture, and this agency only allowed horses of recognized breeds. As Silver Lace was not registered with any breed registry, his owners created a breeding syndicate, and mare owners who bought shares in the "Silver Lace Horse Company" could breed their mares to him. However, his main breeding career coincided with the economic struggles of the Great Depression, and Silver Lace was at one point hidden in a neighbor's barn to prevent his sale at auction. Another significant foundation stallion was Ead's Captain, whose bloodlines appear in about one-third of all American Cream Drafts.
Around 1935, despite the Depression, a few breeders started to linebreed and inbreed cream-colored horses to fix their color and type. In particular, C.T. Rierson began buying cream-colored mares sired by Silver Lace and developing the American Cream breed in earnest. In 1944, a breed association, the American Cream Association, was formed by 20 owners and breeders and granted a corporate charter in the state of Iowa. In 1950, the breed was finally recognized by the Iowa Department of Agriculture, based on a 1948 recommendation by the National Stallion Enrollment Board.
The mechanization of farming in the mid-20th century led to a decrease in the overall draft horse population, and with Rierson's death in 1957, American Cream Draft numbers began to decline. By the late 1950s there were only 200 living American Creams registered, owned by only 41 breeders. The registry became inactive until 1982 when three families who had retained their herds reactivated and reorganized the registry. In 1994, the organization officially changed its name to the American Cream Draft Horse Association (ACDHA).
1990s to the present.
In 1982, owners began blood-typing their horses, and by 1990, genetic testing found that "compared with other draft breeds and based upon gene marker data, the Creams form a distinct group within the draft horses." The American Cream Draft was found to have a genetic relationship with the Belgian breed that was no closer than the ones it had with the Percheron, Suffolk Punch and Haflinger breeds. Registry records dating to the early 20th century show no bloodlines other than draft breeding. As of 2000 there were 222 registered horses, a number that increased to 350 as of 2004. Of these, 40 were "tracking horses" – either purebred American Creams that did not meet color requirements or crossbred horses that mix American Cream and other draft blood, but still meet the physical requirements for the registry. These tracking horses are allowed by certain regulations to be used as breeding stock, with the resulting foals able to be registered as purebred American Creams. Around 30 new horses are registered each year. The Livestock Conservancy considers the breed to be at "critical" status, meaning that the estimated global population of the breed is less than 2,000 and there are less than 200 registrations annually in the US. The Equus Survival Trust also considers the population to be "critical", meaning that there are between 100 and 300 active adult breeding mares in existence today. To help replenish numbers, the ACDHA has developed regulations to permit foals to be registered when produced via methods such as artificial insemination and embryo transfer. Careful use of the appendix registry also allows numbers to increase.
The American Creams that live in Colonial Williamsburg have been called "the most famous of all American Cream Draft horses". In the village they are used for wagon and carriage rides, and as of 2006 there is a breeding program run by Colonial Williamsburg that is working to increase breed numbers.


La Belle Station

La Belle Station also known as Labelle Downs is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in the Northern Territory.
The property is situated approximately west of Batchelor and south of Darwin. La Belle is shares is eastern boundary with Litchfield National Park and Litchfield Station to the south, the Delissaville-Wagait-Larrakia Aboriginal Land Trust is to the north and the Timor Sea is to the west.
The property is composed of many land types. About one third is red dirt and sandy forest of which about half has been cleared with some being converted to humidicola pasture. The remainder is highly productive marine floodplain covered in native wetland grasses such as hymenachne, rice grass, marine couch and cane grass along with introduced grasses. Divided into 34 paddocks it has an estimated carrying capacity of 14,000 head of cattle.
Originally a part of neighbouring Stapleton Station, La Belle was taken up by the Townsend family in 1962. In 2001, the property was placed on the market by the Townsend family partnership. It was stocked with 10,500 head of Brahman cattle.
La Belle along with Welltree Station was sold by Peter Camm in 2008 sold for 72 million, during a land boom.
R. M. Williams Agricultural Holdings acquired the property which it held until 2013 when the company went into receivership. Both La Belle and Welltree were then sold to the Australian Agricultural Company for 27.1 million.


Muir-Hill

Muir Hill (Engineers) Ltd was a general engineering company based at Old Trafford, Manchester, England. It was established in the early 1920s and was significant in the production of simple rail locomotives, and later high horse power tractors and post Second World War dumpers.
History.
Muir Hill machinery have included basic petrol engined railway locomotives, mainly for narrow gauge. The early locos were little more than a Fordson tractor skid mounted on a rail chassis, with a chain connecting the rear axle of the tractor to the rail wheels. Production of locomotives did not continue beyond the 1930s; the company went on to build heavy tractors and construction equipment.
Muir-Hill moved on to producing dumpers also based on Fordson tractor skid units. They also built forklifts based on a tractor skid unit for a period before other manufacturers entered the market with better machines, and built some of the earlier articulated dumpers that evolved into the modern ADT. Muir-Hill later moved into tractor production which continued until the 1980s.
The company name and manufacturing rights transferred hands a number of times, first to E. Boydell and Co, then Winget, then Babcock & Wilcox, then Aveling-Barford, then to Lloyd Loaders (MH),
Muir-Hill tractors have survived longer than comparable models, and a number have been subject to restoration. Threlkeld Quarry Museum holds examples of Muir Hill equipment. The Ravenglass & Eskdale Railway has two examples.
Ffestiniog Railway.
Users of Muir Hill locomotives included the slate quarries of Blaenau Ffestiniog.
This 4wPM locomotive of around 20 hp was constructed by Muir Hill (Engineers) Ltd in about 1922. It came to the FR on loan from the Aluminium Corporation's Cowlyd Reservoir Railway near Dolgarrog, arriving at Blaenau Ffestiniog on 9 April 1924. The loan was arranged by Henry Joseph Jack, who at the time controlled the WHR and FR and believed that a fleet of these units could provide cost-effective haulage for most purposes.
Based on a Fordson tractor, the Muir Hill had three speeds in forward but only one in reverse. Trials were conducted in early May. It performed about as well as could have been reasonably expected, being barely able to pull 'an ordinary guards van' from Beddgelert to South Snowdon (Rhyd Ddu). Later in May it was tried to power the machinery at Boston Lodge. In a further trial it ran very well from Blaenau Ffestiniog to South Snowdon with a small van but could only return to Beddgelert at 2¼ mph because of its inadequate reverse gearing. These poor results were reported to the Board in June and the unit returned to Dolgarrog in August 1924.
Four-wheel-drive tractors.
The company's four-wheel-drive tractors with equal sized wheels by fitting a driven front axle running from output from a sandwich plate between the gearbox and rear axle casings. Because of the size of the axle this meant the whole tractor was raised considerably from standard height. However the traction gains were considerable (as with County and Roadless tractors) and Muir-Hills have been and are used for heavy draught applications.


Rex Natala

Amon Rex Natala (died January 2011) was a Zambian politician. He served as Member of the National Assembly for Bweengwa from 1978 until 1988.
Biography.
Natala was elected to the National Assembly in the 1978 after former Bweengwa MP Harry Nkumbula was deselected by the United National Independence Party (UNIP), then the sole legal party in the country. He was re-elected in 1983 general elections, before being replaced as the UNIP candidate by Eli Mwanang'onze for the 1988 general elections.
Away from politics, Natala was a farmer and chair of the organising committee of the Lwiindi Gonde ceremony. He was a cousin of politician Anderson Mazoka.


Richard John Barton

Richard John Barton II (27 December 1879 – 26 May 1931) was a New Zealand pastoralist, runholder, businessman and author in the early 20th century in Wellington and the Wairarapa.
Life.
Early life.
Richard John Barton was born on 27 December 1879 at Trentham (The Barton Estate) in the Upper Hutt Valley. His family owned generous landholdings in the Hutt Valley and the Wairarapa due to his grandfather Richard Barton being a pioneer settler in New Zealand. His father John Barton inherited the properties of Trentham, Whiterock and other farming stations in the Wellington region. The Barton family were early farmers in the region as well as Wairarapa during the late 19th century.
Education.
With prosperous estates, Barton was educated at the Wanganui Collegiate School, a colonial boarding school established by Sir George Grey. Barton was educated here during the tenure of Walter Empson, an Oxford Alumni who became Headmaster.
Marriage.
In 1906 he married Georgina Hector, the daughter of Sir James Hector, at St Augustine's Church, Petone. After the wedding a reception was held at Sir James Hector's home, Ratanui. They went on to have five sons and one daughter.
Business.
Farming.
Like his father and grandfather, Barton became a pastoralist and was engaged in the family farms at Trentham and in the Wairarapa. In the 1890s the Barton family bought the coastal portion of the Mataikona Station from John Johnston. In 1899 he became manager of the Mataikona in the east coast of the Wairarapa before becoming part of the family partnership in 1915, supervising the run. He extended the farms up towards the Upper plains, known as "Tapia".
Some time between 1904 and 1906 Barton offered to sell the Wellington Golf Club 48.5 hectares of their Heretaunga/Trentham farm which is now the Royal Wellington Golf Club.
Associations and clubs.
Barton was associated with many of Wairarapa's foundation business societies including:
Barton was a foundation member of the Tinui-Wahatahi Rifle Club and a member of the Opaki Rifle Club. He was also a mountaineer, with his name given to "Barton's Track" over Mitre Peak in the Tararua Ranges.
Author.
In 1927 Barton published a compilation of the journals and correspondence of Reverend John Gare Butler, who was his great grand-father. The book was titled "Earliest New Zealand" and described Butler's pioneer missionary work in the Bay of Islands from 1819 to 1824 prior to the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi.
The compilation took over 15 years, including research from the Early Missionary records of the Hocken Library in Otago, and the Turnbull Library in Wellington. The book was dedicated to his father John Barton for "careful custody of old family papers".
During this time it was also noted that he gifted the following items to the Hocken Library in Otago:
Death.
Richard John Barton died suddenly on 26 May 1931 at the age of 51. A telegraph of his obituary was published in the Evening Post within a day and it was noted he was "well known in the Wellington and Wairarapa district".


Henry Lewis (surveyor)

Henry Lewis (1813 – 7 August 1889) was a New Zealand surveyor.
Early life.
Henry Lewis was the second son of Jonathan and Amelia Lewis. He was christened at Bobbingworth, Essex, on 19 December 1813. His father was an auctioneer and surveyor, of Water End Farm near Ongar in Essex.
In the 1851 census Lewis was given as living at Water End Farm with his wife Susana (Susan) and their four children, the oldest of which was five. Susan was originally from Lynn in Norfolk. Lewis's father and older brother Jonathan were also recorded as residents of the house.
Surveyor in New Zealand.
In August 1855 Lewis and his family, which now included a fifth child, arrived in Nelson from Melbourne as steerage passengers on the "Marchioness". They had emigrated to Australia as a first choice, and had probably lived there for a year or more. They had another child that November, and their youngest child was born two years later.
After settling in Brook Street in Nelson, Lewis advertised his services as a land surveyor. Over the next year he picked up contracts for the Nelson Provincial Government along with his private work, such as surveying Native Reserves in the Pelorus and Queen Charlotte sounds. By November 1856 he had entered into a partnership with surveyor and civil engineer John William Gay Beauchamp. Lewis was based on Brook Street in Nelson and Beauchamp was based at Motupipi in Golden Bay. They dissolved the partnership a year later in November 1857, and Lewis continued his practice until he took up a position with the Nelson Provincial survey department. By May 1860 he was one of two assistant surveyors working under the chief surveyor Thomas Brunner.
Discovery of Lewis Pass.
In 1859 and 1860 the Nelson Provincial Government made a concerted effort to open up its territory on the West Coast. The main focus for discovering an overland route through the mountainous region that separated Nelson and the West Coast was via the Buller and its tributary the Maruia to the Grey. While at the Grey, a run-holder named James Mackay had been instructed by Chief Tarapuhi Te Kaukihi that the Maruia Plain was a central point which communicated with the north, east and west coasts. Upon reaching the Maruia Plain from Nelson, a traveller could either continue following the Maruia through Cannibal Gorge which gave access to the Hanmer Plain on the East Coast, or follow the Ruhu Creek over easy pass to the Upper Grey on the West Coast.
While Mackay was exploring the route through the Buller Valley, a local judge named William Thomas Locke Travers tested a theory of his own. He followed the Wairau River to its source and then skirted around the Spenser Mountains by crossing several low passes. Travers believed that the Grey, like the Wairau, took its source from the Spenser Mountains, and when he found an easy access to a stream which he believed to be the headwaters of the Grey, he returned and reported his findings to the Nelson Government.
The Provincial Government immediately despatched Lewis, accompanied by a cadet named Christopher Maling, to investigate whether Travers's route really would offer an easy alternative route to the Grey Valley. They set out on 21 March 1860, followed Travers's directions to the river they supposed to be the Grey, but on travelling down the gorge they found that the river was in fact the Maruia. Retracing their steps back up what they now realised was Cannibal's Gorge, they discovered a pass from the Upper Maruia to a new river, which was later named the Lewis.
Because the Maruia Plain was easier to access from Nelson by the Buller than by the Wairau, Travers's route was of no real use at the time. But because the Lewis River gave access to the Hope River, which in turn gave access to the Hanmer Plain, the route was chosen in the 1930s to form a main road from North Canterbury to the West Coast. Lewis Pass is now the northernmost of three main roads between the east and west coasts, the others being Arthurs Pass (named after Arthur Dudley Dobson) and Haast Pass (named after Julius von Haast). Lewis Pass is the main road between Canterbury and the Buller, Nelson and Tasman districts, and it is used as an alternative route between Canterbury and the central West Coast districts when the Arthurs Pass road is closed.
Later life and death.
In 1866 Henry and Susan's second eldest daughter, Eleanor, married Arthur Dudley Dobson of Canterbury. He was the eldest living son of Canterbury's Provincial Engineer Edward Dobson and since coming to Nelson in 1864 had been working as assistant Provincial Engineer under John Blackett. By 1869 Lewis was Chief Surveyor of Nelson, and when he resigned in December 1871, Dobson was appointed in his place.
After leaving the survey department, Lewis took up residence on property he had bought in Takaka in Golden Bay. He farmed the land with his sons for many years until he retired and moved back to Nelson. He died at the age of 76 in 1889. Susan died fourteen years later in 1903 at the age of 89.


Arthur Wallace

Arthur Wallace (January 4, 1919 – October 11, 2008), was a soil scientist.
Biography.
Schooling.
Wallace received a B.S. from Utah State University (chemistry) in 1943 and at Ph.D. from Rutgers University in 1949 (soils and plant nutrition).
Professor.
He was a professor of Plant Physiology at University of California, Los Angeles (1949–1989).
Accomplishments.
Wallace was elected Fellow of the American Society of Agronomy, of the Soil Science Society of American, of the Crop Science Society of America, and of the American Society for Horticultural Science.
Work & Publications.
Dr. Iron.
Wallace was known as “Dr. Iron” for his research and studies on chelated iron. At a meeting in Berkeley, California, held on December 11, 1953, he formulated the structure of EDDHA which was synthesized by his friend, Harry Kroll and which was commercialized by Geigy as Fe-EDDHA and Sequestrene 138. At that time, EDTA, HEEDTA and DTPA were known. Fe-EDTA was effective in the acidic Florida soils but failed in California giving chelates a poor reputation later reversed with the astounding success of Fe-EDDHA.
He helped organize the biannual international iron nutrition and interactions symposia which have been held since 1979. Wallace hosted the first one at UCLA.
Working in the Middle East and Africa.
He worked with plant mineral nutrition problems in the Middle East and Africa. He made 30 visits to Egypt working with Yossef Wiley, minister of agriculture, to solve some of their agricultural production problems.
Law of the Maximum.
Wallace is known for his Law of the Maximum in lieu of Liebig's law of the minimum. The Law of the Maximum predicts plant yield based on the additivity of nutrients, growth factors and stress factors. He formulated 13 sound rules for the use of fertilizers.
P.A.M. / Soil Conditioner.
Wallace is responsible for the current implementation and success of the soil conditioner – linear, water-soluble, anionic polyacrylamide. Monsanto launched the technology of synthetic and natural polyelectrolytes as soil conditions for the formation of water-stable soil aggregates in 1952. The introduction was written by Firman E. Bear, Arthur’s major professor at Rutgers. The product was marketed under the trade name “Krilium.” The product technically successful but commercially failed due to the high cost of manufacturing and difficulty of use. Krilium became an example of a scientifically successful product but an economical failure. The technology became an embarrassment with an aversion and hesitance to resolve the causes of failure. Dr. Wallace resolved the technical problems, answering the Krilium problem. PAM was reported to be an economic solution of Krilium to condition soil, to reduce soil erosion, to prevent crusting, to help ameliorate sodic soils and to increase crop yield. Various cries were heard such as – “Do not forget the Krilium failure.” PAM is currently fully accepted as a BMP and is used for erosion control such as in burned areas and an economical agricultural soil conditioner.


Mount Bundy Station

Mount Bundy Station is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in Northern Territory.
The property is situated approximately east of Adelaide River and south of Darwin. It is situated on the banks of the Adelaide River on its northern boundary. The majority of the property is composed of savannah woodland.
Established in 1911, one of the first in the Northern Territory, the station originally occupied an area of with the boundaries once located within Litchfield National Park and Kakadu National Park. Mount Bundy was established by brothers Frank and Hubert Fred Hardy who were both renowned buffalo hunters. Fred died when he fell from his horse at Mount Bundy in 1940 aged 59 years. During the second world war the American forces set up an airbase at Mount Bundy for repairing bombers.
The property was acquired in the 1960s by the W. R. Grace Company, and developed as one of the largest cattle ranches of its time, consisting of over 1.1 million acres, and carried over 30,000 buffalo and 20,000 head of Brahman cattle. The property is now much smaller as Grace exited various parts of the business.
The tourist resort portion of the station was on the market in 2014 with an asking price of just under 2 million.
References.


Ole Anton Qvam

Ole Anton Qvam (5 August 1834 – 8 July 1904) was a Norwegian lawyer and Liberal politician, who was the Norwegian Minister of Justice 1891–1893, 1898–1899 and 1900–1902, Minister of the Interior 1899–1900, as well as head of the Ministry of Auditing, Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Justice in 1900, and Norwegian prime minister in Stockholm 1902–1903.
Biography.
Ole Anton Qvam was born in Bolsøy in today's Molde in Romsdal, Norway. He was the son of Ole Larsen Qvam (1782–1844) and Johanne Pedersdatter Ryen (1797–1850). Qvam worked as a teacher in Christiania, Arendal and Setesdal. He began studying law at the University of Christiania and became cand.jur. 1862. He founded the Sparbu and Egge savings bank in 1872, where he was chairman of the board 1873–1886. Mayor of Egge from 1869 to 1885.
Qvam was elected to the Storting for Nordre Trondhjems (Nord-Trøndelag) from 1874 to 1885 and for Søndre Trondhjems (Sør-Trøndelag) from 1885 to 1888. He served as president of the Odelstinget from 1886 to 1888.
Qvam was Minister of Justice in the first government of Johannes Steen from March 6, 1891 to May 1, 1893, and later also Justice Minister of Johannes Steen's second government from February 17, 1898 to April 1899. On April 21, 1902, Qvam became Norway's Prime Minister in Stockholm during the first government of Otto Blehr.
Personal life.
He was married to feminist pioneer Fredrikke Marie Qvam (1843-1938) who was President of the Norwegian Association for Women's Rights and founded the Norwegian Women's Public Health Association. Both he and his wife were co-founders of the Norwegian Association for Women's Rights in 1884. He retired from government during 1903. He died at Egge on July 8, 1904.


Kinze Manufacturing, Inc.

Kinze Manufacturing, Inc. is an American company that produces agricultural equipment.
It was established in 1965 by Jon Kinzenbaw in Ladora, Iowa and later relocated to nearby Williamsburg, Iowa. Kinze began by manufacturing many types of agricultural implements. It began to grow quickly by seizing an opportunity to 'repower' John Deere tractors by replacing the OEM engine with a Detroit Diesel engine during a time when Deere was experiencing problems with engine production. Starting with a metal fabrication and repair shop, Kinzenbaw moved into the production of auger wagons and fertilizer applicators. Today, Kinze's main operations are manufacturing row-crop planting equipment up to 36 rows and grain carts up to 1500 bushels (~53,000 liters). Kinze was a pioneer in the development of the folding equipment and invented the front fold and the rear fold planter. Their planters are some of the most popular currently in use.
Today Kinze is a leading manufacturer of row crop planters and giant grain auger carts and one of North America's largest independently owned farm equipment companies.
The Kinze factory is located north of Interstate 80 west of Williamsburg, IA. The factory employees have combined some of their products into extremely large scale lawn sculptures visible from the Interstate.
Operations in Europe.
On June 12, 2013 Kinze opened a production plant in Lithuania. It is the company’s first manufacturing plant outside of the United States. The factory should help Kinze Manufacturing meet the growing demand for its production in Russia, Ukraine, Hungary, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.


Jat people

The Jat people () (also spelled Jatt and Jaat) are a traditionally agriculture based community largely in rural parts of Northern India and Pakistan. Originally pastoralists in the lower Indus river-valley of Sindh, Jats migrated north into the Punjab region in late medieval times, and subsequently into the Delhi Territory, northeastern Rajputana, and the western Gangetic Plain in the 17th and 18th centuries. Of Hindu, Muslim and Sikh faiths, they are now found mostly in the Indian states of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh and the Pakistani provinces of Sindh and Punjab.
The Jats took up arms against the Mughal Empire during the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The community played an important role in the development of the martial Khalsa "panth" of Sikhism. The Hindu Jat kingdom reached its zenith under Maharaja Suraj Mal (1707–1763). By the 20th century, the landowning Jats became an influential group in several parts of North India, including Punjab, Western Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana and Delhi. Over the years, several Jats abandoned agriculture in favour of urban jobs, and used their dominant economic and political status to claim higher social status.
History.
The Jats are a paradigmatic example of community- and identity-formation in early modern Indian subcontinent. "Jat" is an elastic label applied to a wide-ranging community from simple landowning peasants to wealthy and influential Zamindars The Jats had their origins in pastoralism in the lower Indus valley of Sindh. At the time of Muhammad bin Qasim's conquest of Sind in the 8th century, Arab writers described agglomerations of Jats in the arid, the wet, and the mountainous regions of the conquered land. The Arab rulers, though professing a theologically egalitarian religion, the position of Jats or the discriminatory practices against them that had been put in place in the long period of Hindu rule in Sind. Between the eleventh and the sixteenth centuries, Jat herders migrated up along the river valleys, into the Punjab, which had not been cultivated in the first millennium. Many took up tilling in regions such as Western Punjab, where the sakia (water wheel) had been recently introduced. By early Mughal times, in the Punjab, the term "Jat" had become loosely synonymous with "peasant", and some Jats had come to own land and exert local influence.
According to historians Catherine Asher and Cynthia Talbot, Over time the Jats became primarily Muslim in the western Punjab, Sikh in the eastern Punjab, and Hindu in the areas between Delhi Territory and Agra, with the divisions by faith reflecting the geographical strengths of these religions. During the decline of Mughal rule in the early 18th century, the Indian subcontinent's hinterland dwellers, many of whom were armed and nomadic, increasingly interacted with settled townspeople and agriculturists. Many new rulers of the 18th century came from such martial and nomadic backgrounds. The effect of this interaction on India's social organization lasted well into the colonial period. During much of this time, non-elite tillers and pastoralists, such as the Jats or Ahirs, were part of a social spectrum that blended only indistinctly into the elite landowning classes at one end, and the menial or ritually polluting classes at the other. During the heyday of Mughal rule, Jats had recognized rights. According to Barbara D. Metcalf and Thomas R. Metcalf:
As the Mughal empire now faltered, there were a series of rural rebellions in North India. Although these had sometimes been characterized as "peasant rebellions", others, such as Muzaffar Alam, have pointed out that small local landholders, or "zemindars", often led these uprisings. The Sikh and Jat rebellions were led by such small local zemindars, who had close association and family connections with each other and with the peasants under them, and who were often armed.
These communities of rising peasant-warriors were not well-established Indian castes, but rather quite new, without fixed status categories, and with the ability to absorb older peasant castes, sundry warlords, and nomadic groups on the fringes of settled agriculture. The Mughal Empire, even at the zenith of its power, functioned by devolving authority and never had direct control over its rural grandees. It was these zemindars who gained most from these rebellions, increasing the land under their control. The triumphant even attained the ranks of minor princes, such as the Jat ruler Badan Singh of the princely state of Bharatpur.
Hindu Jats.
In 1669, the Hindu Jats, under the leadership of Gokula, rebelled against the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb in Mathura. The community came to predominate south and east of Delhi after 1710. According to historian Christopher Bayly
The Jats had moved into the Gangetic Plain in two large migrations, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries respectively. They were not a caste in the usual Hindu sense, for example, in which Bhumihars of the eastern Gangetic plain were; rather they were an umbrella group of peasant-warriors. According to Christopher Bayly:
By the mid-eighteenth century, the ruler of the recently established Jat kingdom of Bharatpur, Raja Surajmal, felt sanguine enough about durability to build a garden palace at nearby Dig (Deeg). According to historian, Eric Stokes,
Muslim Jats.
When Arabs entered Sindh and other Southern regions of current Pakistan in the seventh century, the chief tribal groupings they found were the Jats and the Med people. These Jats are often referred as "Zatts" in early Arab writings. The Jats were the first converts to Islam, and many were employed as soldiers by the new Arab Muslim administration in Sindh. The Muslim conquest chronicles further point at the important concentrations of Jats in towns and fortresses of Lower and Central Sindh.
Today, Muslim Jats are found in Pakistan and India.
Sikh Jats.
According to censuses of the British Raj period, most Sikh Jats were converted from Hindu Jats. Writing about the Jats of Punjab, the Sikh author, Khushwant Singh opined that their attitude never allowed themselves to be absorbed in the Brahminic fold :
In Punjab, the states of Patiala, Faridkot, Jind, and Nabha were ruled by the Sikh Jats.
Demographics.
According to anthropologist Sunil K. Khanna, Jat population is estimated to be around 30 million (or 3 crore) in South Asia in 2010. This estimation is based on statistics of the last caste census and the population growth of the region. The last caste census was conducted in 1931, which estimated Jats to be 8 million, mostly concentrated in India and Pakistan. Deryck O. Lodrick estimates Jat population to be over 33 million (around 12 million and over 21 million in India and Pakistan, respectively) in South Asia in 2009 while noting the unavailability of precise statistics in this regard. His estimation is based on a late 1980s population projection of Jats and the population growth of India and Pakistan. He also notes that some estimates put their total population in South Asia at approximately 43 million in 2009. His religion-wise break-up of Jats is as follows: 47% Hindus, 33% Muslims, and 20% Sikhs.
Republic of India.
In India, multiple 21st-century estimates put Jats' population share at 20–25% in Haryana state and at 20–35% in Punjab state. In Rajasthan, Delhi, and Uttar Pradesh, they constitute around 9%, 5%, and 1.2% respectively of the total population.
In the 20th century and more recently, Jats have dominated as the political class in Haryana and Punjab. Some Jat people have become notable political leaders, including the sixth Prime Minister of India, Charan Singh.
Consolidation of economic gains and participation in the electoral process are two visible outcomes of the post-independence situation. Through this participation they have been able to significantly influence the politics of North India. Economic differentiation, migration and mobility could be clearly noticed amongst the Jat people.
Jats are classified as Other Backward Class (OBC) in seven of India's thirty-six States and UTs, namely Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. However, only the Jats of Rajasthan – excluding those of Bharatpur district and Dholpur district – are entitled to reservation of central government jobs under the OBC reservation. In 2016, the Jats of Haryana organized massive protests demanding to be classified as OBC in order to obtain such affirmative action benefits.
Pakistan.
Many Jat Muslim people live in Pakistan and have dominant roles in public life in the Pakistani Punjab and Pakistan in general. Jat communities also exist in Pakistani-administered Kashmir, in Sindh, particularly the Indus delta and among Seraiki-speaking communities in southern Pakistani Punjab, the Kachhi region of Balochistan and the Dera Ismail Khan District of the North West Frontier Province.
In Pakistan also, Jat people have become notable political leaders, like Hina Rabbani Khar.
Culture and society.
Military.
Many Jat people serve in the Indian Army, including the Jat Regiment, Sikh Regiment, Rajputana Rifles and the Grenadiers, where they have won many of the highest military awards for gallantry and bravery. Jat people also serve in the Pakistan Army especially in the Punjab Regiment.
The Jat people were designated by officials of the British Raj as a "martial race", which meant that they were one of the groups whom the British favoured for recruitment to the British Indian Army. The Jats participated in both World War I and World War II, as a part of the British Indian Army. In the period subsequent to 1881, when the British reversed their prior anti-Sikh policies, it was necessary to profess Sikhism in order to be recruited to the army because the administration believed Hindus to be inferior for military purposes.
The Indian Army admitted in 2013 that the 150-strong Presidential Bodyguard comprises only people who are Hindu Jats, Jat Sikhs and Hindu Rajputs. Refuting claims of discrimination, it said that this was for "functional" reasons rather than selection based on caste or religion.
Religious beliefs.
Deryck O. Lodrick estimates religion-wise break-up of Jats as follows: 47% Hindus, 33% Muslims, and 20% Sikhs.
Jats pray to their dead ancestors, a practice which is called "Jathera."
Varna status.
There are conflicting scholarly views regarding the varna status of Jats in Hinduism. Some sources state that Jats are regarded as Kshatriyas, while others assign Vaishya or Shudra varna to them. According to Santokh S. Anant, Jats, Rajputs, and Thakurs are at the top of the caste hierarchy in most of the north Indian villages, surpassing Brahmins. Assigning Vaishya varna to Jats, he notes that they perform the dual duties of Kshatriyas and Vaishyas in the Punjab region. According to Indera P. Singh, Brahmins demoted the varna status of Jats from Kshatriya to "Sat Shudra" (clean Shudra) in the Vedic period for challenging the authority of Brahmins. According to Irfan Habib, Jats were a "pastoral Chandala-like tribe" in Sindh during the 8th century. Their 11th-century status of Shudra varna changed to Vaishya varna by the 17th century, with some of them aspiring to improve it further after their 17th-century rebellion against the Mughals. Some scholars point out widow remarriage as the main cause for Jats being placed at a lower position than Rajputs within the Kshatriya varna.
The Rajputs refused to accept Jat claims to Kshatriya status during the later years of the British Raj and this disagreement frequently resulted in violent incidents between the two communities. The claim at that time of Kshatriya status was being made by the Arya Samaj, which was popular in the Jat community. The Arya Samaj saw it as a means to counter the colonial belief that the Jats were not of Aryan descent but of Indo-Scythian origin.
Clan system.
The Jat people are subdivided into numerous clans, some of which overlap with other groups. Hindu and Sikh Jats practice clan exogamy.
In popular culture.
Jatt are part of Punjabi culture and are often portrayed in Indian and Pakistani films and songs.


Heinrich Vater

Heinrich August Vater (5 September 1859 in Bremen – 10 February 1930 in Dresden) was a German soil scientist and forestry scientist. Vater was a pioneer in the areas of forest soil science, land evaluation, and forest fertilization.
In 1884 he received his doctorate at Leipzig with the dissertation "Die fossilen Hölzer der Phosphoritlager des Herzogthums Braunschweig". He was an employee of the Royal Saxon Geological Survey, and in 1886 qualified as a lecturer of mineralogy and geology at the Polytechnic Institute in Dresden. During the following year, he became a professor at the Academy of Forestry in Tharandt. In 1898 he became a member of the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina.


J. Finzer and Brothers Company

J. Finzer and Brothers Company, originally Five Brothers Tobacco Works, was a tobacco business in Louisville, Kentucky. The business was established in 1866 by the five Finzer brothers: John, Benjamin, Frederick, Rudolph, and Nicholas. The company's historic warehouse building was constructed in 1900 at 419 Finzer Street. The warehouse is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and was also used as Stewarts Dry Goods Warehouse and more recently was renovated to become the Lofts of Broadway.
History.
The brothers were born in the Canton Berne, Switzerland. They came to the U.S. and learned to make plug tobacco at Louisville's tobacco factories.
Benjamin died in 1875 and Frederick died in 1883. Rudolph Finzer withdrew from the firm in 1882, leaving John and Nicholas to run the company.
Known for quality products and with good relations to area businessmen, the brothers built up the business and incorporated in 1882. The capital stock of the company was $200,000 and it manufactured about 4,000,000 pounds of plug tobacco annually as well as 1,000,000 pounds of smoking tobacco.
A fire destroyed their factory in 1880, it was rebuilt in 1882, and the warehouse constructed later in 1900.
Product line.
The Finzers sold Burley leaf tobacco in sixteen-ounce plugs of navy tobacco. Their other brands included Jolly Tar, Five Brothers, and Pastime. The company published The Tobacconist, a trade paper. and used various promotions and advertising campaigns to market their wares. The business was acquired by American Tobacco Company shortly after the start of the 20th century.


Buffelsdraai Landfill Site Community Reforestation Project

The Buffelsdraai Landfill Site Community Reforestation Project (BLSCRP) was initiated in 2008 to alleviate climate change impacts associated with hosting elements of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in Durban. The proposed carbon offset was to be achieved through the planting of more than 500 000 indigenous trees within the buffer zone of the Buffelsdraai Landfill Site. Restoring the forest ecosystem was identified as a way of "absorbing event-related greenhouse gas emissions while enhancing the capacity of people and biodiversity to adapt to the inevitable effects of climate change".
History.
The purchasing, development and commissioning (in early 2006) of the Buffelsdraai Landfill was undertaken to accommodate the increasing solid waste produced from the northern suburbs of Durban and surrounding areas. The site was to receive municipal solid waste for 50 to 70 years. Historically, the land had been privately owned and used for sugarcane production for over 100 years. As a result, many areas were infested with alien invasive plants(IAPs) and weeds. All landfills sites are required by law to have a buffer zone between the active landfill and adjacent communities. The Buffelsdraai buffer zone would be a minimum of 800 m wide and 787 ha in extent and would shield the neighbouring communities, namely Buffelsdraai and Osindisweni, from the impacts of the landfill.
In 2008, the eThekwini Municipality made a decision that farming would be phased out, in order to rehabilitate the land to indigenous forest. As a result, the eThekwini Municipality's Environmental Planning and Climate Protection Department (EPCPD), in partnership with the Wildlands Conservation Trust (WCT) and eThekwini Municipality's Durban Solid Waste (DSW), initiated the Reforestation Project. This decision contributed towards the establishment of a “Conservancy” encompassing both the landfill site and buffer zone, in accordance with the required conditions of the environmental authorisation provided. The Reforestation Project would incorporate “Ecosystem-based Adaptation principles as a means to improve resilience to climate change". The holistic approach of the eThekwini Municipality would address biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation and adaptation, rural development and poverty alleviation.
While the EPCPD has led the Reforestation project, the DSW is the owner and manager of the land, and the WCT is the appointed implementing partner that oversees all tree growing and planting operations through the application of their ‘Indigenous Trees for Life’ programme. Small-scale, initial tree planting was undertaken in 2009, followed by more intensive planting from 2010 onwards.
Description.
The Buffelsdraai Landfill Site is located north-west of Durban city approximately 8 km west of the small town of Verulam. It is the largest regional waste landfill site and is owned and managed by the eThekwini Municipality's Durban Solid Waste department. The footprint of the active landfill area (or solid waste disposal area) is 116.2 ha. Trees have been planted into 580 ha of the 787 ha buffer zone. The balance of the buffer zone would comprise existing grasslands, woodlands, wetlands and riparian areas, which would be restored and managed. Additional trees were planted to create a border around the landfill footprint in order to screen off the landfill operations (of the odour, noise and visual effects) and act as a firebreak. A wide strip of thorny trees were planted around the buffer zone boundary, to act as a “living fence”. This “fence” is an alternative to the traditional barbed wire fence, and is considered effective in minimising incursions by vehicles, people and stock animals into the buffer zone area.
The EPCPD has plans to construct a regional ‘Reforestation Hub’ at the BLSCRP site. The centre will be used by researchers, scholars, community members and tourists that will come to learn about climate change adaptation and restoration ecology in a local context. The centre will comprise an indigenous tree nursery and a building that displays sustainability green technologies, such as solar panels, water capture, storage and reuse, efficient lighting etc.
Geology and soils.
A soil survey was undertaken prior to the rehabilitation of the buffer zone to determine the distribution of soil types. This would assist with identifying the likely historic distribution of primary vegetation types so that these may be replicated during rehabilitation of the site. The dominant geology within the site is Dwyka Tillite, a glacial conglomerate parent material that is base-rich, hard and resistant to weathering. The eastern boundary is composed of shale, sandstones and red sands of the Pietermaritzburg, Vryheid and Berea Formations. The central part of the study area is underlain by shales of the Ecca Group, Pietermaritzburg Formation. Eight soil forms were identified at Buffelsdraai. The historic landuse of sugarcane cultivation on moderate to steep slopes on site has resulted in the top 50 cm of the soil profile being completely mixed by land preparation activities as well as a net export of soil material by overland runoff and erosion of gullies.[5] The impacts of cultivation of the past several decades were likely to have influenced soil formation.
Project benefits.
Benefits from the BLSCRP include: the restoration of biodiversity, restoration of ecosystems for improved delivery of ecosystem services, and the creation of jobs and livelihood benefits for poor communities. Success at the BLSCRP site has resulted in an expansion of the approach to two other project sites - one at iNanda Mountain and one at Paradise Valley Nature Reserve, all of which offer the same adaptation and mitigation co-benefits.
Carbon offsets.
With the planting of a large density trees, the Buffelsdraai forest habitat has the ability to store a high volume of carbon, thus playing an important role in reducing the amount of carbon dioxide (a powerful greenhouse gas) in the atmosphere. The BLSCRP site would sequester 42 214 tons of CO2 over a 20-year period.
Socio-economic.
The communities involved in the BLSCRP are some of the most impoverished and vulnerable in Durban. By restoring the forest ecosystem in Buffelsdraai the livelihoods and resilience of people are supported. The ‘Indigenous Trees for Life’ model developed and implemented by the Wildlands Conservation Trust, was adopted as the approach for tree production. The approach encourages local, unemployed people, known as ‘Tree-preneurs’, to collect indigenous tree seeds which they propagate at their homesteads. The tree seedlings are traded to the BLSCRP in exchange for credit notes, which in turn can be traded for basic food items, clothes, building materials, used to pay for school fees and driving lessons. Tree-preneurs have also been able to build new homes and enrol in higher education programmes.
The restoration of forest habitat has provided the resident community with many other employment and skills development opportunities, including invasive alien plant species control; active tree planting; catchment protection; fire management and waste recycling. Ninety percent of people that benefit from this project were previously earning wages below the poverty line, and were considered to be amongst the most vulnerable communities in South Africa. Since the BLSCRP project was initiated in 2008, up until early 2015, a total of 455 jobs (over 50 full-time, 16 part-time and 389 temporary) have been created for local community members and there are over 600 active tree-preneurs.
Increased biodiversity.
There has been a marked increase in fauna and flora. As of January 2015, 595 476 trees were planted. Tree species have increased from 0 to 51, and the total bird species have increased from 80 to 145 over a five-year period. A total of 9 millipede and 22 mollusc species were recorded on site.
Improved ecosystem goods and services.
The “ecological infrastructure” being built, in the form of a restored indigenous forest, will enhance the supply of ecosystem goods and services to rural people that are highly dependent on natural resources for their basic survival and safety. Forests provide ecosystem goods to people, in the form of food, wood, fibre and medicine. The ecosystem services derived from the restored forests include enhanced biodiversity refuges, water quality, river flow regulation, flood mitigation, sediment control, improved visual impact and a reduction in fire-risk. “Such services enhance the long-term climate change adaptation benefits derived by local communities, as well as short-term resilience to unpredictable and dangerous weather patterns".
Building partnerships.
The eThekwini Municipality has established key partnerships with households in local communities. The Municipality has also engaged with other partners and implementing agents, including the Durban Research Action Partnership (D'RAP), established with the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN); an Environmental Education partnership with the Wildlife and Environmental Society of South Africa (WESSA); a partnership with the Municipality's Coastal, Stormwater and Catchment Management Department, for construction of a weir for water monitoring purposes; and a partnership with the Municipality's Energy Office, which has provided photovoltaic and solar geyser technologies.
Project gains.
In 2011, the BLSCRP was selected as one of the top 10 global projects as part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Momentum for Change Initiative. It has also received a Gold Standard Validation Certificate, from the Climate, Community & Biodiversity Alliance (CCBA) for delivering social, biodiversity and carbon sequestration benefits at an international standard.
Lessons learnt.
One survey found that the tree-preneurs were not sufficiently aware of why the reforestation programme was initiated, nor of its potential benefits. As such, better education for the local community members has been suggested, as a means to improve their understanding of conservation and climate change, as well as the ecosystem services that they may benefit from. The project ultimately also needs to assist tree-preneurs with becoming less dependent on the project for exchange of trees for goods and to actually start selling trees on the open market. The programme could assist tree-preneurs with finding ways to develop and expand the commercial potential of supplying trees to nurseries (including fruit trees and vegetables, seedlings and actual produce), establishing additional nurseries, and supplying to local and regional markets.


LL Flooring

LL Flooring (formerly Lumber Liquidators Flooring) is an American retailer of hard-surface flooring including hardwood flooring, laminate flooring, vinyl plank flooring, tile flooring, bamboo flooring and cork flooring, as well as flooring tools and accessories.
History.
Founding.
Lumber Liquidators Flooring was started in 1994 by Tom Sullivan, a building contractor who began purchasing excess wood from other companies. He then resold the wood from the back of a trucking firm's yard in Stoughton, Massachusetts. Three years later in 1996, the company found their niche market in hardwood flooring. On January 5, 1996, the company's first store opened in West Roxbury, Massachusetts, and sold 150 square feet of floors on the first day. By August of that year, they opened up a second store in Hartford, Connecticut.
Expansion.
The company has grown to be one of the largest retailers of hardwood flooring in the United States. It expanded to more than 375 Lumber Liquidators stores with over 1,000 employees in 47 states and Canada. It also launched online e-commerce, catalogs, and its Virginia call center. By the end of 2018 the company was operating over 415 stores across North America.
The company is currently headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. The company's CEO is Charles E. Tyson. The firm is listed and trades under . In 2019 the company announced it would be moving the corporate offices from Toano to Richmond VA.
In 2009, Lumber Liquidators began receiving sponsorship from Scripps’ HGTV, DIY Network and ABC’s "".
The company expanded into Canada in the fourth quarter of 2010. The expansion plan was to add 36 to 40 stores.
In April 2020, the company renamed itself to LL Flooring.
Controversies.
A 2013 report by the Environmental Investigation Agency revealed that Lumber Liquidators' indiscriminate and poor sourcing practices resulted in the destruction of critically endangered tiger habitats and forests.
Further investigation led to the conviction of a Russian supplier in 2014. Shortly after the conviction Lumber Liquidators lost about twenty percent in stock value for potential violation of the Lacey Act. During 2015, the company was involved in controversy regarding the level of formaldehyde in the Chinese-made laminate flooring that it was selling. A number of class action lawsuits were brought on by customers, due to the formaldehyde issue and other customer service issues.
The company appointed John M. Presley as Chief Executive Officer. The company's founder, Tom Sullivan, served as interim CEO following the resignation and was replaced in November 2015 by John Presley.
On October 22, 2015, Lumber Liquidators pleaded guilty in federal court to the illegal importation of hardwood flooring. In February 2016, a federal judge sentenced the company to $13.15 million in penalties, consisting of $7.8 million in criminal fines, $3.15 million in civil forfeiture, $1 million in criminal forfeiture, and $1.2 million to conservation organizations. It was the largest financial penalty ever issued for violating the Lacey Act of 1900.


Terra Nitrogen Company

Terra Nitrogen Company, Limited Partnership is an American company that was set up on September 20, 1991 and now is headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois. The company markets nitrogen fertilizers, most of which are anhydrous ammonia and urea ammonium nitrate solutions (UAN). Terra Nitrogen Company (TNCLP) is a subsidiary of CF Industries and Terra Nitrogen, L. P. (TNLP) is the operating partner of TNCLP.
Operations.
Terra Nitrogen Company's parental company is CF Industries, a leading global fertilizer and chemical company, with 3,000 employees and 9 manufacturing plants operating in Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Their Donaldsonville, Louisiana, plant is the world’s largest nitrogen complex.
A joint venture ammonia facility in located in the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago.
Terra Nitrogen GP Inc. (TNGP) also manufactures phosphate fertilizer products.
Link to CF's 2017 Report:
Products and services.
The company’s major products are nitrogen fertilizer, which is essential for plant (such as corn and wheat) growth and yields. Products of this company are urea ammonium nitrate (UAN) liquid solution, with a nitrogen content between 28 percent to 32 percent; and anhydrous ammonia, with a nitrogen content about 82 percent.


Azerbaijan horse

The Azerbaijan horse () is a mountain-steppe racing and riding horse. It is named after the geographic region where the horse was originally developed, Azerbaijan in the Caucasus. The average speed by running of Azerbaijan horse is 1600 metres in 2 minute, 66 seconds.


Uttar Bihar Gramin Bank

Uttar Bihar Gramin Bank is a government owned Regional Rural Bank (RRB) in the State of Bihar, India. It is one of the largest regional rural banks in India in terms of branch network, staff strength and area of operation.
The bank was created from the amalgamation of Uttar Bihar Kshetriya Gramin Bank and Kosi Kshetriya Gramin Bank(transferor regional rural banks) by Government of India in 1976 as per Gazette Notification issued by the Indian Ministry of Finance under Sub-Section (1) of Section 23 A of the Regional Rural Bank Act, 1976 (21 of 1976). It is sponsored by Central Bank of India in the state of Bihar as a single regional rural bank. The bank is headquartered in Muzaffarpur.
The current Chairman is Shri Sohail Ahmad.
The current General Manager is Shri Mahendra Kumar.
Regional office.
The bank has 20 regional offices.
Areas of operation.
The Uttar Gramin Regional Bank functions through a network of 1001 branches in 18 districts in the State of Bihar.
Uttar Bihar Gramin Bank: IFSC:CBIN0R10001
Award.
The bank was awarded for the best performance in banking linkage of self-help groups (SHGs) in the Regional Rural category, at the state credit seminar organized by National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard).
Recruitment.
Bank recruits officials through the common written examination (CWE) hosted by Institute of Banking Personal Solution(IBPS) every year.


Cyril A. Stebbins

Cyril Adelbert Stebbins (1880–1953) was an American educator involved with nature and agricultural education. His publications in the early twentieth century were influential in promoting gardening in children's education, and he wrote much of the curriculum for the United States School Garden Army, a federal victory garden project during World War I. He wrote several publications with Ernest Brown Babcock and published several field guides to birds with his son Robert C. Stebbins.
Biography.
Cyril Stebbins was born in Harrisville, Wisconsin on June 20, 1880, the son of A. O. Stebbins, of English descent, and Bessie Fuller. His family moved to South Dakota and then Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he attended North Community High School, playing on the baseball and football teams and graduating in 1898. Soon after, he moved to Chico, California, and entered the Chico State Normal School (now California State University, Chico), graduating from that institution in 1900. During the majority of the next decade, Stebbins taught at several schools in Glenn, Colusa, and Solano counties. He first became a teacher in the schools of Glenn County, and later became principal of a school in Arbuckle, and remained in that city three years; from there he filled the position of principal of the grammar schools in Dixon for one year; finally he became an instructor in the Chico State Normal for three years. Stebbins then entered the University of California in Berkeley, and in 1910 received his degree of bachelor of science, and was appointed as instructor in the Agricultural Educational Division of the University. He taught in this department for two years, in the meantime receiving his master's degree, in 1912. During his time at Berkeley he organized a community garden project where local children grew fruits and vegetables for profit. In 1913 he returned to Chico to become the head of the Biological Science Division of the State Normal. Upon his departure from Berkeley, two petitions were filed to the U.C. Regents–one from parents and one from children–urging that he be retained and given sufficient funding to continue his work on the children's gardening projects.
Stebbins was active in youth education and employment. During his activities as one of the directors of the California State Fair, he initiated the idea of an industrial vocational department for grammar and high school boys. It was instituted in the annual State Fair in 1916, with Stebbins in charge, premiums aggregating a thousand dollars being offered that year. The development and success of the undertaking warranted premiums totaling two thousand dollars the following year, and it became one of the most popular attractions, and the exhibit became a permanent part of the fair. His contributions to industrial and vocational education, include "Principles of Agriculture Through the Home and the School Garden", a three-hundred-page volume; and, with Ernest Brown Babcock, "Elementary School Agriculture", both published by the Macmillan Company. He was also editor of "The Junior Agriculturist", published in Chico. Incident to his scientific pursuits, Stebbins occasionally contributed articles to the "Nature Study Review", the "San Francisco Call"; the "Agricultural Journal", "Town and Orchard", and other agricultural and educational journals.
In 1917, Stebbins was appointed by the Federal Government as Regional Director of the United States School Garden Army for the Western States, for which he wrote curriculum and promoted the United States School Garden movement. Being detailed by the Commissioner of Education at Washington, he edited a series of films dealing with agriculture and gardening, which were widely distributed in theaters and in schools, to supplement the use of textbooks in gardening and agriculture. California Governor Hiram Johnson appointed Stebbins a member of the Recreation Inquiry Committee. The committee made a recreation survey of California and published its findings in a bulletin published by the State for general distribution and given a wide circulation.
Stebbins was a state chairman of the School Garden Association of America; a member of the California Peach Growers' Association, in which he was trustee for the Butte County Association; and a member of the California Prune and Apricot Growers Association and the California Almond Growers Association.
Personal life and family.
In Berkeley, Stebbins married Louise Beck, born in Switzerland and educated in California's public schools and the State Normal School. In the Chico area, the Stebbins family lived on a 15-acre small-scale ranch where they grew almonds, and plums, then later moved to a 20-acre ranch and primarily grew almonds, peaches, and watermelons. Around 1924, Stebbins and his family moved to Southern California, living first in Pomona, then in Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles, where Stebbins taught hygiene and agriculture at North Hollywood High School. Cyril and Louise had seven children; three boys and four girls. Their eldest child, Robert, would become a noted herpetologist and illustrator, and would co-author several field guides to birds with Cyril; in 1941 their first co-production, "What Bird is That?", was printed in the family garage in Van Nuys. Stebbins died in 1953 and is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills).
Cited sources.
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Victoria River Downs Station

Victoria River Downs Station, also known as Victoria Downs and often referred to as The Big Run, is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in the Northern Territory of Australia.
Location.
It is located about south east of Timber Creek and west of Daly Waters in the Northern Territory. The property abuts the Daguragu Aboriginal Land Trust to the south, Camfield Station, Montejinni and Killarney Stations to the east, Delamere to the north and Humbert River Station and the Bilinarra-Jutpurra Aboriginal Land Trust to the west. The Auvergne and Wave Hills Stock routes both pass through the station as does the Buntine Highway that passes through the south east corner.
Description.
Currently Victoria River Downs has an area of The property was once the world's largest pastoral property with an area of , but following much of the land being resumed it is now less than half its former size, and less than half the size of the current largest, Anna Creek station.
Several watercourses pass through the property including the Wickham River, Camfield River, Townsend River, Humbert River, Gill Creek, Blackskin Creek, Depot Creek, Jasper Creek and Battle Creek.
The property is composed of several land types including ridges and plateaus on sandstone or dolomite, gently undulating plains of dolomite overlaid with loamy soils, limestone outcrops and alluvial floodplains with cracking clays. Vegetation includes wire grass, white grass and black spear grass on the red earth country with stands of ribbon grass, flinders grass, blue grass and feathertop wire grass on the clay country.
The station has been operating for over 100 years and is currently owned by Heytesbury Pty. Ltd.. The eastern boundary of Victoria River Downs adjoins Killarney Station, Killarney was excised from Victoria Downs when the station exceeded in size. The much smaller Humbert River station is on the western boundary.
Camfield Station was also once an outstation of Victoria Downs which is now owned by the Australian Agricultural Company. This station occupies an area of and was won in a ballot in 1952 by Paul Vanderleer before having a series of owners, then was finally acquired by AACo. in 2004.
Pigeon Hole Station () was until 2000 an outstation of Victoria River Downs.
History.
The station was originally established in 1883 on Bilingara and Karranga native lands by Charles Fisher and Maurice Lyons, who also owned nearby Glencoe Station. The men stocked the property with 20,000 head of cattle that had been overlanded from Wilmot by Nat Buchanan. The lease had been granted by the South Australian government in December 1879 for an area of land . Fisher ran into monetary problems and following legal battles the property was awarded to Goldsbrough Mort & Co. Ltd in 1889. In early 1900 Goldsbrough sold the lease and the stock for £27,500 to a syndicate consisting of Forrest, Emmanuel & Company and the Kidman Brothers.
In 1893 the station was carrying an estimated herd of 23,000 cattle and by 1894 the station occupied an area of , carried 30,000 head of cattle and some 500 horses. The station was shipping cattle at this time to Batavia via Singapore along with other stations in the area, in 1894 the station shipped 2,205 head for which they were paid £7717.
In March 1895, Goldsbrough Mort & Co employed the notorious Jack Waston to manage the station. Watson had such a "bad name among the blacks" that the Aboriginal people used as cheap labour on the station had all run away. Even his own "blackboy" servant named Pompey had cleared out. When Watson later heard that Pompey had been killed, he asked the local mounted police constable, William Willshire to bring him Pompey's skull so he could use it as a spittoon. Willshire complied with the request and brought him the skull.
In May 1895, a group of Aboriginal people attacked a supply wagon travelling through nearby Jasper Gorge. Two colonists were seriously wounded and a significant amount of firearms and ammunition were taken. It was thought that with these weapons, a formidable local Aboriginal uprising could result. Before the police could act, Jack Watson decided to organise a punitive expedition himself, to punish those involved and also try to recover the guns. He gathered 17 armed and mounted men and in two days tracked down a large camp of Aboriginal people, fatally shooting possibly 60 people. Watson did not find any guns but he did return with three captured women. One of these women had a broken arm, another was covered in welts from being whipped and the third was lactating from her breasts but no child was with her. These women later escaped.
Watson died in the Katherine River in 1896 and his brother, Robert Molesworth Watson, took over the management of Victoria River Downs.
By 1901 the station was carrying about 30,000 head of cattle. and by 1907 Victoria River Downs was stocked with an estimated 69,350 head of cattle.
In 1902 a partnership between Sidney Kidman and the Emanuel brothers acquired the property which occupied an area of and was regarded as one of the largest cattle stations in the world.
Sidney Kidman sold Victoria River Downs to Bovril Australian Estates in 1909 along with another two stations, one being Northcote and the other in Western Australia near Wyndham called Carlton Hill for a total of £200,000.
By 1923 the size of the property was estimated at making it the largest property in the Northern Territory at the time. In 1949 the Surveyor General of the Northern Territory, R. Miller, arrived to resume an area of from the eastern side of the property. Parts of the property have since been carved up leaving an area of .
William Buckland, a Melbourne businessman, purchased the property in 1955 and then sold again in 1960 to Hooker Corporation. When changes were made to the lease in 1961 the Animal Production Branch approached the Hooker Pastoral Company to excise a small portion of the lease to establish a research station. The area was surrendered in 1963. It was named the Victoria river Research Station in 1965 but is commonly referred to as Kidman Springs. The research station commenced operations 1969. In 1984, the station was sold again, this time to Peter Sherwin for 11.6 million. Kerry Packer had sought to buy the property and had negotiated the sale agreement with Hooker but the Northern Territory government invoked its right of veto sale of large parcels of land and instead gave Sherwin approval. Packer acquired Newcastle Waters instead.
Sherwin was subject to a takeover bid by Elders in 1988 and Elders gave a 17.4% share in the property to Robert Holmes a Court, by 1989 Holmes a Court owned all of Victoria River Downs which today trades as Heytesbury Beef.
The station and surrounding areas were pounded with heavy rains in February 2010, receiving over the course of the month. This figure was the highest monthly total ever in the 120 years that rainfall has been recorded at Victoria River Downs, and smashed the previous record set in 2004.
In 2014 the property experienced 88 consecutive days with temperatures over between the September and November.
The station is served by the Victoria River Downs Airport, also owned by Heytesbury.


Anna Hackl

Anna Hackl (born 1931) is a farmer in Schwertberg.
In the middle of "Mühlviertler Hasenjagd".
In February 1945, family Langthaler, who lived in a farmhouse in Schwertberg, hid two Russian prisoners of war: Michail Rybtschinskij (died 2008) und Nikolai Zimkolo (died 2001), who escaped from the concentration camp in Mauthausen. At the risk of jeopardizing with their own life, they gave them shelter for three months from February 2, 1945. Even when the SS and Volkssturm came to search the house they had not been betrayed. At this time, more than 500 prisoners had escaped. Just eleven of them survived the freezing temperature and the continuing pursuit of the SS. The majority of the refugees were caught and shot on the spot. These actions went down in history as Mühlviertler Hasenjagd.
In the past years, then 14-year-old Anna Hackl, Langthaler by birth, also received honors on behalf of her deceased mother, Anna Langthaler. Anna Hackl, married and mother of five children, visits about 30 schools per year to tell young people about the horror and difficulties of the period. Andreas Gruber used parts of the heroic deed of the Langthaler family in his movie The Quality of Mercy.


Slovak Rough-haired Pointer

The Slovak Rough-haired Pointer is a gundog breed developed after World War II in Slovakia. It is known by many confusingly similar names in English, including the Slovak Wirehaired Pointer, the Slovak Pointing Griffon, the Slovak Wirehaired Pointing Griffon, and the Slovak Wirehaired Pointing Dog. Its closest relative is the Bulgarian Hound.
Despite the nearly identical names, the SRHP is "not" the same as the Wirehaired Pointing Griffon, a smaller but similar breed with a slightly longer coat developed for essentially the same purposes by the Dutch and now most common in France.
In the original Slovak, the SRHP breed is known as the Slovensky Hrubosrsty Stavac (Ohar), or the Slovenský Ohař Hrubosrstý In other languages, this breed is referred to as the Griffon d'arret Slovaque a Poil Dur, Slowakischer Rauhbart, and the Grifon de Muestra Eslovaco de Pelo Duro.
At one point, the Slovaks who developed the breed asked the Weimaraner Club of Germany to recognize this dog under the name Rough-haired Weimaraner, but the request was rejected.
Origin.
The breed was established by crossing German Wirehaired Pointers, Weimaraners, and the Cesky Fousek (also known as the Bohemian Wirehaired Pointing Griffon). The SRHP breed has had slight input from the German Wirehaired Pointer and Pudelpointer as well. The developer, Koloman Slimak, wanted a dog with great stamina which would track, point, retrieve in water or land, and be suitable for a range of prey from birds, hares and other small animals, and large game up to the size of deer.
The breed was accepted by the FCI in 1985 or 1995 and categorized as a Continental Pointing Dog of the braque type. It is not yet recognized by the AKC in the U.S.
First introduced into the United Kingdom in 1997, they were featured in a "meet the breed" segment of the 2007 broadcast of the famed Crufts dog show in Britain.
The breed is also recognized by the North American Versatile Hunting Dog Association and the Malaysian Kennel Association.
Appearance.
With a body type much like the three breeds from which its foundation stock was derived, the SRHP has an intelligent, alert expression and a "rough" or "broken" coat, with harsh, wiry hair and whiskers ("facial furnishings" or, informally, "moustaches") like those of the German Wirehaired Pointer or the Cesky Fousek. The coat is of moderate length in any shade between a tweedy gray-brown and the classic pewter-silver coat of the Weimeraner. The eyes may range from the deep amber of the German Wirehaired Pointer to the light shades seen in the Weimaraner.
The FCI has developed a detailed standard which states the eyes of juveniles may be "azure" but those of adults must be amber. White is permitted on the chest and feet. Lighter and darker shades of gray are permitted throughout the coat, even to the point of speckling. The FCI standard further requires a dark nose, eyelids, and pads of the feet; a scissors bite; and a moderately sloped stop of about 45°. Per the FCI standard, the tail is docked at 50% of natural length, and the dewclaws are removed. The back is straight, and the height at the withers ought to be from for males and from for bitches. The FCI standard also states that "the ratio of length of the body to the height at the withers must be of 10:9 in the males and of 10:8 in the females."