Doctor Who and the Silurians

The new series of Doctor Who does not start until autumn, so I have decided to watch classic episodes until then. The latest of which is Doctor Who and the Silurians The first episode which was broadcast 31January 1970 The Silurians are a fictional race of reptile-like humanoids and The species first appeared in Doctor Who in the 1970 serial Doctor Who and the Silurians, and were created by Malcolm Hulke. The first Silurians introduced are depicted as prehistoric and scientifically advanced sentient humanoids who predate the dawn of man; in their backstory, the Silurians went into self-induced hibernation to survive what they predicted would be a large geological upheaval caused by the Earth capturing the Moon. The 1972 serial The Sea Devils also by Hulke introduced their amphibious cousins, the so-called ‘Sea Devils’. Both Silurians and Sea Devils made an appearance in 1984’s Warriors of the Deep. After Warriors of the Deep, the Silurians did not appear in the show again before its 1989 cancellation. Heavily redesigned Silurans were reintroduced to the series in 2010, following the show’s 2005 revival, and have recurred frequently since then.Commonly called Silurians, the creatures have also been referred to by other names. The terms “Silurians” and “Eocenes” are human misnomers, as the creatures predate those times. The name Homo reptilia is first used to describe the creatures in a novelisation of Doctor Who and the Silurians by Malcolm Hulke, and is first used in the series proper in the episode “The Hungry Earth”.

The story starts at An experimental nuclear power research centre built into a network of caves in Wenley Moor which has been experiencing mysterious power drains and mental breakdowns amongst staff. UNIT is called in to investigate, and the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and Liz meet Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney) at the plant. While exploring the caves, one of the workers at the centre is found dead with giant claw marks on his body, and his companion’s mind has been traumatised. Lawrence, the Director, resents UNIT’s presence and feels that it will interfere with the working of the plant, which is trying a new process to generate nuclear electric power. Dr Quinn, the Deputy Director, and Major Baker, the security chief, believe there is a saboteur in the centre, and the Doctor discovers that the logs of the nuclear reactor’s operation have also been tampered with. When the Doctor makes his way into the caves, he is attacked by a dinosaur-like creature.

The Brigadier decides to explore the caves with armed men. Baker fires at a creature he spots in the caves and is attacked by another. The Doctor returns to the centre with Baker, taking samples of the blood from when he fired at the creature. Examining the blood, the Doctor finds similarities to “higher reptiles”. In the meantime, the creature reaches the surface and stumbles into a barn to hide where it is discovered by a farmer and his wife and attacks them. The farmer dies but the wife survives and identifies her attacker. While investigating the barn, Liz is knocked unconscious by the creature and it flees. She tells the Brigadier when she awakes, and he orders a manhunt across the moor just as Quinn appears. The Brigadier and the Doctor follow the creature’s tracks, then The Doctor goes to Quinn’s cottage, and notes that it is remarkably hot, like a reptile house. Quinn asks the Doctor to leave , who then finds a globe that depicts the Earth’s continents as they were 200 million years ago, and notes on the Silurian era of Earth’s history.Back at the cottage, Miss Dawson tries to persuade Quinn to tell the Doctor everything, but Quinn is adamant that he will keep the wounded Silurian captive until he is given the advanced scientific knowledge he wants. When the Doctor goes to the cottage to try to reason with Quinn, he finds him dead in his chair. The Doctor discovers the Silurian, but it escapes. Baker, goes exploring the caves and is soon captured by the Silurians and interrogated about the strength of humans. The Doctor and Liz follow his route and gain access to the Silurian base, where they discover Baker in a locked cage. He tells them that they must warn the surface. The Doctor and Liz leave undiscovered, but not before the discover the reason for the energy drains that the reactor has been experiencing.

Meanwhile, Masters, the Permanent Under-Secretary in charge of the centre, arrives for a personal inspection, and The Doctor decides to tell them all about the Silurians in the caves, urging a peaceful contact instead of the Brigadier’s proposed armed expedition. However, this falls on deaf ears . The Doctor goes to warn and reason with the Silurians, but they imprison him. He then learns that the Silurians retreated underground when they saw the Moon approaching Earth millions of years before and have been in hibernation until they were disturbed by human activity. Soon The Brigadier and his men are released, but  Baker gets infected with a virus  the Doctor, obtains a sample of the virus so he can discover a cure. The Doctor reaches the centre, and he warns everyone to stay away from Baker, who collapses with the virus. Masters, however, decides to return to London, unaware that he has also been infected. Baker is taken to a local hospital and dies there The Brigadier prevents Baker’s doctor and nurse from leaving to avoid spreading the virus while the Doctor returns to the centre. The Brigadier and Liz try to warn London, while all of the centre’s staff are inoculated with a stopgap vaccine, except for Lawrence, who refuses. Masters, meanwhile, has reached London undetected. Soon the virus begins to spread and the deaths begin. The Silurians decide to clobber the Doctor before he finds a cure so they attack him and kidnap him.But not before he manages to discover and write down the cure which is discovered by Liz, and it is soon being mass-produced and distributed.

Despite this setback The Silurians decide to use a weapon to destroy the Van Allen Belt and make the Earth’s environment hostile to humankind, and coerce the Doctor to help. UNIT troops are lured into the caves and battle with the Silurians. Meanwhile the Doctor Liz and the Brigadier are taken to the reactor control room where the Doctor, overloads the reactor and tells the Silurians that the area will be uninhabitable and irradiated for at least 25 years. The Silurians disengage from the battle with UNIT and re-enter the caves to hibernate until the danger has passed deciding to return in 50years time and exterminate humanity. The Reactor is repaired and the remaining Silurian realises he has been duped into sending his race back to sleep. on Wenley Moor, the Doctor tells Liz that he proposes to revive the Silurians one by one and try to reach a peaceful compromise between them and humanity. However, the Brigadier decides that far more extreme measures are required, much to the Doctor’s disgust

Doctor Who – The Seeds of Doom

The first exciting episode of The Doctor Who story The Seeds of Doom was broadcast on 31January 1976. It starts off  In Antarctica, where British scientists Charles Winlett and Derek Moberley discover a pod buried in the permafrost, and take it back to their camp, where Stevenson, the base botanist identifies it as vegetable-based and estimates it has been buried in the ice for some twenty thousand years. Richard Dunbar of the World Ecology Bureau shows theDoctor photographs  of the pod and he examines the pictures and believes it to be extraterrestrial. He tells Dunbar to contact the expedition. Back at the base, the pod starts growing . In England, Dunbar visits millionaire Harrison Chase who collects plants and considers it his mission to protect the plant life of Earth. Dunbar shows him pictures of the pod, its possible extraterrestrial origin and that it could be a valuable specimen so Chase calls for one of his men, Scorby, telling him to take Keeler along.At the base, Winlett is attacked when A frond-like tentacle whips out and stings his armq. When Stevenson and Moberley find him, Winlett’s face is covered with green hives. The Doctor and Sarah arrive at the base. In the sickbay, Winlett’s body temperature and pulse are dropping rapidly. His face and body are now covered with a green fungus, and its growth is accelerating. The Doctor asks for a blood test on Winlett and examines the remains. Outside the base, the Doctor uncovers another pod. Noting that the pods travel in pairs, the Doctors transfers it to the base freezer. On analysis, Winlett’s blood is found to contain schizophytes instead of blood – microscopic organisms akin to plant bacteria. The Doctor tells Sarah that Winlett is turning into a Krynoid, a kind of galactic weed that settles on planets and eats the animal life.

when The Doctor leaves to check on Winlett, he is attacked by the now mutated Winlett who has Transformed into a Krynoid which escapes and takes shelter in the outside generator hut. Scorby and Keeler  steal the remaining pod and decide to blow up the base and escape in their plane. The Doctor and the others get free, but are attacked by the Krynoid, which kills Stevenson. The Doctor and Sarah flee the base as the bomb Explodes, and after Regaining consciousness in the snow, the Doctor and Sarah are rescued. Meanwhile, Scorby and Keeler return to Chase in England with the second pod.  At the meeting, Dunbar arranges for the Doctor to go to the Botanic Institute and the Doctor and Sarah Jane also visit Amelia Ducat, one of the world’s leading flower artists.  Chase and Keeler (who is also a botanist)decide to experiment on the pod and inject it with fixed nitrogen. Dunbar calls Chase and tells him that the Doctor and Sarah escaped and may be trying to sneak into the mansion, however they are spotted by Scorby, who capture them. The Doctor and Sarah are brought before Chase and, the Doctor asks Chase grimly to hand over the pod. Chase refuses: He has the greatest collection of plants in the world, and when the pod flowers, it will be his crowning achievement, Chase decides to show the Doctor and Sarah around the mansion, and his plant laboratory. Keeler notes that the pod is growing, so Chase tells Keeler to inject more nitrogen into the pod. Scorby escorts the Doctor and Sarah into the gardens to kill them, but they manage to escape and warn Sir Colin. However, Sarah gets captured again. The Doctor makes his way back into the mansion and watches horrified as Chase starts using Sarah Jane as part of his experiment with the Krynoid. The Doctor rescues Sarah and in the confusion, a frond from the pod stings Keeler’s arm. Keeler begs Chase to get him to a hospital, but Chase is more fascinated with the transformative process than saving Keeler’s life. So Chase and Hargreaves take Keeler to the nearby cottage Instead.

When the Doctor returns to the empty laboratory, he is captured by Scorby and a guard, meanwhile Amelia Ducat arrives demanding her money and Sarah enters the cottage, seeing Keeler, who has begun Transforming into a Krynoid So She escapes back to the house and while in hiding, asks AmeliaDucat to take a message to Sir Colin. so, Ducat relays SarahJane’s message to Sir Colin And Dunbar,  who realising he has made a terrible mistake, says he will go in and get the Doctor. He tells Sir Colin that, if he does not return in half an hour, to return to London and call UNIT. Sarah  the Doctor. Hargreaves finds that Keeler has now almost completed his transformation, and runs in a panic as the creature frees itself. In the mansion, Dunbar pleads with Chase to abandon the experiment as Hargreaves reports Keeler’s transformation to Chase. Dunbar says that this has gone far enough, and he is going to get help. Chase tells Scorby to stop him. Scorby pursues Dunbar through the grounds meanwhile Keeler Disappears The Doctor leaves to search for the Krynoid. which is now far larger than the Winlett creature was, and no longer even humanoid. Dunbar is clobbered by the Krynoid and thecommotion  attract the attention of Scorby and the guards as well as the Doctor and Sarah, who manage to escape to a cottage and barricade themselves in. The Krynoid speaks using Keeler’s voice, demanding that the Doctor come out and join it. Scorby is more than willing to give up the Doctor until Sarah Jane points out that without the Doctor they have no chance of defeating the Krynoid.

Scorby throws an improvised bomb out an upstairs window and the Doctor makes a run for it. The Krynoid pursues him but the Doctor escapes in the limousine, leaving the Krynoid behind. Scorby tries to find Chase and Hargreaves and they begin barricading the windows in preparation for the Krynoid’s attack. Chase makes his way through the grounds and confronts the Krynoid. The Doctor arrives at the Bureau as Major Beresford warns he can’t do anything without evidence. The Doctor warns the Krynoid can channel its power through other plants, turning vegetation against humans. He shows them a series of reports of deaths of people near Chase’s estates being killed by plants. He then calls Sarah Jane and tells them Beresford is preparing to attack the Krynoid, but the Krynoid cuts the phone wires. Chase arrives and tells them that it’s the plants’ world, and humans are only parasites, so Scorby, Sarah Jane, and Hargreaves go in to confront Chase and he speaks of how the world will be made perfect. They can’t get through to him as he talks about how he is one with the plants and animals are the enemy. Sarah Jane notices that the plants are closing in on them. The Doctor and a UNIT soldier drive onto the grounds while the plants overwhelm Sarah Jane and the others and start to strangle them.

The Doctor and a UNIT soldier, arrive with chemical plant-killer. They dispose of the plants, saving Scorby and Sarah Jane while the older Hargreaves is dead. Chase runs away and the Doctor and the others make their way into the lab and start removing the plants. But once they’re outside Chase locks the door behind them and they can only gaze in horror as the now enormous Krynoid towers over them. UNIT soldiers arrive and open fire. The Doctor believes that Chase is possessed by the Krynoid and decides to eliminate him., Chase and the others eventually return to the laboratory while the Krynoid tries to break its way in. Scorby starts to panic and wants to run, but the Doctor warns him that every plant on the grounds is under the Krynoid’s control. Meanwhile, Chase puts Henderson in the compost machine, killing him. when the Krynoid renews its attack Scorby panics and makes a run for it, which does not go well. Then The Doctor and Sarah Jane realize that Henderson is also missing so she goes to find him and is confronted by a mutated Chase who explains he’s become part of the plant world thanks to the Krynoid and refers to humanity as parasites, before attacking Sarah Jane. Beresford contacts the Doctor, who warns they have 15 minutes until the Krynoid germinates, spreading its seeds across England. The Doctor tells them to launch an air strike before it’s too late. Chase decides to Dispose of Sarah Jane by feeding her into the compost machine luckily The Doctor arrives and tries to rescue her, but Chase turns the machine back on and Attacks him. Meanwhile The RAF arrive as Beresford and Sir Colin desperately look for any signs of the Doctor and Sarah Jane who are trapped inside trying to avoid being composted and escape past the Krynoid covering the house…

Never mind the Sex Pistols here’s Johnny Rotten

John Lydon, A.K.A Johnny Rotten vocalist with The Sex Pistols was born 31st January 1956.  formed in London in 1975 The Sex Pistols were responsible for initiating the punk movement in the United Kingdom and inspiring many later punk and alternative rock musicians. Although their initial career lasted just two-and-a-half years and produced only four singles and one studio album, Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols, they are regarded as one of the most influential acts in the history of popular music, and the album is regarded as a classic by many.

They evolved from “The Strand”, a London band formed in 1972 with working-class teenagers Steve Jones on vocals, Paul Cook on drums, and Wally Nightingale on guitar. According to a later account by Jones, both he and Cook played on instruments they had stolen. vocalist Johnny Rotten joined soon after In August 1975, when he was spotted wearing a Pink Floyd T-shirt with the words I Hate handwritten above the band’s name and holes scratched through the eyes. The line-up was completed by guitarist Steve Jones, drummer Paul Cook and bassist Glen Matlock, who was replaced by Sid Vicious in early 1977.

Under the management of impresario Malcolm McLaren, the band provoked controversies that captivated Britain. Their behaviour, as much as their music, brought them national attention and their concerts repeatedly faced difficulties with organizers and authorities, and public appearances often ended in mayhem. Their 1977 single “God Save the Queen”, attacking Britons’ social conformity and deference to the Crown, precipitated the “last and greatest outbreak of pop-based moral pandemonium”.

Since the spring of 1977, the three senior Sex Pistols had also been returning to the studio periodically with Chris Thomas to lay down the tracks for the band’s debut album. Initially to be called God Save Sex Pistols, it became known during the summer as Never Mind the Bollocks. In January 1978, after a turbulent tour of the United States, Rotten left the band and announced its break-up. Over the next several months, the three other band members recorded songs for McLaren’s film version of the Sex Pistols’ story, The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle. Vicious died of a heroin overdose in February 1979. In 1996, Rotten, Jones, Cook and Matlock reunited for the Filthy Lucre Tour; since 2002, they have staged further reunion shows and tours. On 24 February 2006, the Sex Pistols—the four original members plus Vicious—were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Tribute to George Jackson Churchward

Best Known for designing GWR 3440 City of Truro, which held the unofficial record for the first steam locomotive to travel at over 100 miles per hour, British railroad engineer George Jackson Churchward was Born 31st January 1857. Apprenticed in the Newton Abbot works of the South Devon Railway in the GWR’s Swindon Works, he rose from draughtsman through several positions, including Carriage Works Manager, and in 1897 was appointed Chief Assistant to William Dean. After 5 years as Chief Assistant, he succeeded Dean as Locomotive Superintendent. In the 19th and early 20th century, railway companies were fiercely competitive. Speed meant revenue and speed was dependent on engineering. Churchward delivered to the GWR from Swindon a series of class-leading and innovative locomotives. Arguably, from the early 1900s to the 1920s the Great Western’s 2-cylinder and 4-cylinder 4-6-0 designs were substantially superior to any class of locomotive of the other British railway companies. On one occasion, the GWR’s directors confronted Churchward, and demanded to know why the London and North Western Railway were able to build three 4-6-0 locomotives for the price of two of Churchward’s “Stars”. Churchward allegedly gave a terse response: “Because one of mine could pull two of their bloody things backwards!”

Churchward preferred locomotives without trailing wheels, to maximise adhesion on the South Devon banks of Dainton, Rattery and Hemerdon on the West of England mainline to Plymouth, then the Great Western’s most important route. Due to the weight and dimensional restrictions required to pass over all the GWR’s lines, he designed narrow fireboxes, but with good circulation. Combining high boiler pressures with superheating made efficient use of the high calorific-value steam coal from the mines in South Wales. Other refinements included feed-water distribution trays beneath the top-fitted clack boxes to minimize boiler stress and large bearing surfaces to reduce wear.

Churchward also made advancements in carriage design. He introduced the GWR’s first steel-roofed coaches and is also credited with introducing to Britain several refinements from American and French steam locomotive practice. Among these were the tapered boiler and the casting of cylinders and saddles together, in halves. His choice of outside cylinders for express locomotives was also not standard in Britain for that time. Many elements of British practice were retained, of course. His locomotives for the most part used British plate frames, and the crew was accommodated in typical British fashion. The selection of a domeless boiler was more common to Britain than to the U.S. In 1922 Churchward retired, and C. B. Collett inherited his legacy of excellent, standardised designs. These designs influenced British locomotive practice to the end of steam. Major classes built by the LMS and even British Railways 50 years later are clearly developments of Churchward’s basic designs. The LMS Stanier Class 5 4-6-0 and the BR standard class 5 are both derived from his Saint class early examples of which date to 1902.

The first class of locomotives with which Churchward won success and worldwide recognition was the 4-4-0 ‘City’ class, which soon became one of the most famous class locomotives in the world at the time. One of them, City of Truro, became the first engine in the world to haul a train at 100 miles per hour in 1904 (although unauthenticated). He went on to build the ‘County’ class and the ‘Star’ class. Number 3440 City Of Truro is a Great Western Railway (GWR) 3700 (or ‘City’) Class 4-4-0 locomotive, designed by George Jackson Churchward and built at the GWR Swindon Works in 1903. (It was rebuilt to a limited extent in 1911 and 1915, and renumbered 3717 in 1912). It is one of the contenders for the first steam locomotive to travel in excess of 100 miles per hour (160.9 km/h). City of Truro was timed at 8.8 seconds between two quarter-mile posts whilst hauling the “Ocean Mails” special from Plymouth to London Paddington on 9 May 1904. This timing was recorded from the train by Charles Rous-Marten, who wrote for The Railway Magazine and other journals. If exact (Rous-Marten’s stopwatch read in multiples of 1/5 second), this time would correspond to a speed of 102.3 mph (164.6 km/h), while 9 seconds would correspond to exactly 100 mph.Its maximum speed has been the subject of much debate over the years.

Marcus Mumford

Marcus Mumford, the lead singer with the incredibly lively folk rock band Mumford and Sons was born 31st January 1987. The earliest memories of the band performing together are within the close confines of a rehearsal room in Putney, and street-side jamming sessions on the pavement ahead of a show. It was a scene already common to the band as musicians falling in and out of bands of each and every genre. Band members Ben Lovett and Marcus Mumford were already working on songs together from their school days, but those songs didn’t realise their full potential until Winston Marshall (armed with a banjo and dobro), and Ted Dwane (double bass, but with a penchant for being a multi-instrumental marvel) gave these songs new arrangements, and injected them with a real ‘band’ dynamic. Within a few months, Mumford & Sons released their eponymously named debut EP,which featured the first, self-produced recordings of ‘Roll Away Your Stone’, ‘Awake My Soul’, and ‘White Blank Page.

Mumford and Sons Debut Album “Sigh no More” was released in October 2009 to much critical Acclaim and rave reviews  and won the band a UK Brit Award in 2010 (Best Album), and was nominated for the prestigious Mercury Prize Award in the same year. Outside of Britain, Mumford & Sons also picked up two Grammy nominations (Best New Artist, Best Rock Song), and performed alongside Bob Dylan covering Maggie’s Farm at the awards themselves.

They also toured relentlessly in support of Sigh no More, The live shows in London sold-out instantly and were rammed to the rafters and this was soon replicated across the whole of the UK and The British and Ireland shows were selling out rapidly with each and every passing tour. A second EP was released, ‘Love Your Ground’, which featured the band’s own recordings of ‘Little Lion Man’ and the firm live favourite, ‘Feel The Tide’. This was followed by more touring, round Europe and They also had a ten-day live adventure across India, and also played to sold-out arenas in America and Australia. They also made an awesome appearance at Glastonbury 2011 and their second album “Babel” was released in 2012

Chad Channing (Nirvana)

Chad Channing, American ex-musician with Seattle Grunge band Nirvana was born born 31st January 1967.Nirvana were formed by singer/guitarist Kurt Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic in Aberdeen, Washington in 1987. Nirvana went through a succession of drummers, the longest-lasting being Dave Grohl, who joined the band in 1990.In the late 1980s Nirvana became established as part of the Seattle grunge scene, . The band eventually came to develop a sound that relied on dynamic contrasts, often between quiet verses and loud, heavy choruses.

Nirvana released their first single, “Love Buzz”, in November 1988. The following month, the band began recording its debut album, Bleach, which was released on the independent record label Sub Pop in 1989 and was highly influenced by the heavy dirge-rock of the Melvins and Mudhoney, 1980s punk rock, and the 1970s heavy metal of Black Sabbath. Novoselic noted in a 2001 interview with Rolling Stone that the band had played a tape in their van while on tour that had an album by The Smithereens on one side and an album by the black metal band Celtic Frost on the other, and noted that the combination probably played an influence as well.

Following the release of Bleach in June 1989, Nirvana embarked on its first national tour, and the album became a favorite of college radio stations. Although Sub Pop did not promote Bleach as much as other releases, it was a steady seller,and had initial sales of 40,000 copies. However, Cobain was upset by the label’s lack of promotion and distribution for the album. In late 1989, the band recorded the Blew EP with producer Steve Fisk. In a late 1989 interview, Cobain noted that the band’s music was changing. He said, “The early songs were really angry … But as time goes on the songs are getting poppier and poppier as I get happier and happier. The songs are now about conflicts in relationships, emotional things with other human beings”. In April 1990, the band began working with producer Butch Vig at Smart Studios in Madison, Wisconsin on recordings for the follow-up to Bleach. During the sessions, Cobain and Novoselic became disenchanted with Channing’s drumming, and Channing expressed frustration at not being actively involved in songwriting. As bootlegs of Nirvana’s demos with Vig began to circulate in the music industry and draw attention from major labels, Channing left the band.

Life after Life by Kate Atkinson

Being an avid reader I was interested to learn that theThe Telegraph newspaper has partnered with WHSmith to offer readers another novel. This time readers have the chance to obtain the Costa Coffee award winning novel Life After Life by Kate Atkinson, for just £2.99 instead of the RRP £7.99) between Thursday, January 30, 2014 and Wednesday, February 5, 2014, or  by presenting one of the printed vouchers published in the paper on Thursday, January 30, or Saturday, February 1. 2013.

The novel follows the exploits of Ursula Todd and has-a premise similar to Groundhog Day and asks What if you had the chance to live your life again and again, until you finally got it right? it features a baby born during a snowstorm in England 1910 who tragically perishes before drawing it’s first breath, whilst the same baby is born elsewhere in England during a snowstorm and survives

The novel asks what if there were second chances? And third chances? In fact an infinite number of chances to live your life? Would you eventually be able to save the world from its own inevitable destiny? And would you even want to? Life After Life follows Todd as she lives through the turbulent events of the last century again and again. With wit and compassion, Kate Atkinson finds warmth even in life’s bleakest moments, and shows an extraordinary ability to evoke the past. Here she is at her most profound and inventive, in a novel that celebrates the best and worst of ourselves.

Phil Collins

Best known as a drummer and vocalist for British progressive rock groups Genesis and Brand X, as well as being a  popular solo artist, the English singer-songwriter, drummer, pianist producer and actor Phil Collins LVO celebrates his birthday on 30th January. Collins’s professional music career began as a drummer, first with Flaming Youth and then more famously with Genesis, after he answered a Melody Maker classified ad for “…a drummer sensitive to acoustic music, and acoustic twelve-string guitarist”.

The first album Nursery Cryme was released a year later. Although his role remained primarily that of drummer and backing vocalist for the next five years, he twice sang lead vocals: once on “For Absent Friends” (from Nursery Cryme) and once on “More Fool Me” (from Selling England by the Pound). In Genesis, Collins originally supplied backing vocals for front man Peter Gabriel, singing lead on only two songs: “For Absent Friends” from 1971′s Nursery Cryme album and “More Fool Me” from Selling England by the Pound, which was released in 1973.

Following Gabriel’s departure in 1975, Collins became the group’s lead singer, and sang lead vocals on several chart hits in the United Kingdom and the United States between 1975 and 2010, either as a solo artist or with Genesis. He has released many great albums, either as part of Genesis or as a Solo Artist including INVISIBLE TOUCH, FOXTROT & GENESIS, His singles, sometimes dealing with lost love, ranged from the drum-heavy “In the Air Tonight”, dance pop of “Sussudio”, piano-driven “Against All Odds”, to the political statements of “Another Day in Paradise”.

Collins has won numerous music awards throughout his career, including seven Grammy Awards, five Brit Awards—winning Best British Male three times, an Academy Award, and two Golden Globes for his solo work. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Genesis in 2010, and is one of only three recording artists (along with Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson) who have sold over 100 million albums worldwide both as solo artists and (separately) as principal members of a band. In 2008, Collins was ranked the 22nd most successful artist on the “The Billboard Hot 100 Top All-Time Artists.

Sydney Sheldon

Academy Award-winning American writerSidney Sheldon  sadly passed away 30 January 2007. Born February 11, 1917 , His TV works spanned a 20-year period during which he created The Patty Duke Show (1963–66), I Dream of Jeannie (1965–70) and Hart to Hart (1979–84), but he became most famous after he turned 50 and began writing best-selling novels, such as Master of the Game (1982), The Other Side of Midnight (1973) Windmills of the Gods nd Rage of Angels(1980). He sadly passed away on January 30, 2007, but remains the seventh best selling fiction writer of all time.

Windmills of the Gods is an exciting espionage thriller which features a character named Mary Ashley, a professor at Kansas State University, who is offered an ambassadorship by Paul Ellison, the US president. At first She rejects the offer because her husband, Dr. Edward Ashley, does not want to leave his medical practice, and she is not willing to be separated from him. She also feels that it is harder to find a good doctor for a small Kansas town than an ambassador to a foreign country. When her husband suddenly dies in a suspicious traffic accident, Ashley accepts the President’s offer in order to fill the void in her life. She is sent to Romania, behind the Iron Curtain, where she finds that everyone is conspiring against her. She’s on the glinting edge of East-West confrontation, a beautiful and accomplished scholar who has suddenly become the new US ambassador to an Iron Curtain country, a woman who is about to dramatically change the course of world events – if she lives. For Mary Ashley has been marked for death by the world’s most proficient and mysterious assassin, and plunged into a nightmare of espionage, kidnapping and terror.

 

Ferdinand Porsche

Best known for creating many Porsche automobiles as well as the first hybrid vehicle (gasoline-electric), the Volkswagen Beetle, and the Mercedes-Benz SS/SSK, .Austrian automotive engineer Ferdinand Porsche sadly passed away 30 January 1951. Born 3rd September 1875 in in Maffersdorf in the Czech Republic. He showed high aptitude for mechanical work at a very young age. He managed to attend classes at the Imperial Technical School in Reichenberg (Czech: Liberec) at night while helping his father in his mechanical shop by day. Thanks to a referral, Porsche landed a job with the Béla Egger Electrical company in Vienna when he turned 18 In Vienna he would sneak into the local university whenever he could after work. Beyond auditing classes there, Porsche had never received any higher engineering education. During his five years with Béla Egger, Porsche first developed the electric hub motor.In 1898, Porsche joined the Vienna-based factory Jakob Lohner & Co, that produced coaches for Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, as well as for the kings of England, Sweden, and Romania. Lohner had begun construction of automobiles in 1896 under Ludwig Lohner. Their first design, unveiled in 1898, was the “System Lohner-Porsche”, a carriage-like car driven by two electric motors, directly fitted within the front wheel hubs, and powered by batteries. This drive train construction was easily expanded to four-wheel drive, by simply mounting two more electric motors to the rear wheels as well, and indeed such a specimen was ordered by the Englishman E. W. Hart in 1900. In December that year, the car was presented at the Paris World Exhibition under the name Toujours-Contente. Even though this one-off vehicle had been commissioned for the purposes of racing and record-breaking.Whilst employed by Lohner, Porsche introduced the”Mixte”vehicle/transmission concept in 1901: instead of a massive battery-pack, an internal combustion engine built by the German firm, Daimler, was fitted to a generator to drive the electric hub motors and (for vehicle reliability) a small battery pack. This way Porsche had created the first petroleum electric hybrid vehicle on record, although since sufficiently reliable gears and couplings weren’t available at the time, he chose to make it a series-hybrid, an arrangement currently more common in diesel-electric or turbo-electric railway locomotives than automobiles. he up to 56 km/h (35 mph) fast carriages broke several Austrian speed records, and also won the Exelberg Rally in 1901 with Porsche himself piloting a front-wheel drive hybrid specimen. It was later upgraded with more powerful engines from Daimler and Panhard, which proved to be enough to post more speed records. In 1905, Porsche was recognized with the Poetting prize as Austria’s most outstanding automotive engineer.

In 1906, Austro-Daimler recruited Porsche as their chief designer. Porsche’s best known Austro-Daimler car was designed for the Prince Henry Trial in 1910, named after Wilhelm II’s younger brother Prince Heinrich of Prussia. Examples of this streamlined, 85 horsepower (63 kW) car won the first three places, and the car is still better known by the nickname “Prince Henry” than by its model name “Modell 27/80″.By 1916 Porsche had advanced to Managing Director and received the honorary doctorate degree, “Dr. techn h.c.” from the Vienna University of Technology in 1917 (hence the “Dr. Ing h.c” in his name, meaning “Doktor Ingenieur Honoris Causa”). Porsche successfully continued to construct racing cars, winning 43 out of 53 races with his 1922 design. In 1923, Porsche left Austro-Daimler but landed a new job as Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft’s Technical Director in Stuttgart, Germany a few months later. He received another honorary doctorate from the Stuttgart Technical University for his work at Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft in Stuttgart and later the honorary title Professor. While at Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft, he came up with several very successful race car designs. The heavy series of models equipped with superchargers that later culminated in the Mercedes-Benz SSK dominated its class of motor racing in the 1920s.He also designed the Benz Tropfenwagen, which was the first race car with mid-engine, rear-wheel drive layout. In 1926, Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft and Benz & Cie merged into Daimler-Benz, with their joint products called, Mercedes-Benz.In April 1931 Porsche founded his consulting firm, Dr. req. h.c. F. Porsche GmbH, Konstruktionen und Beratungen für Motoren und Fahrzeugbau, in Stuttgart, Then founded a subsidiary company Hochleistungs Motor GmbH (High Efficiency Engines Ltd.) in 1932 to develop a racing car, for which he had no customer. Based on Max Wagner’s mid-engined layout 1923 Benz Tropfenwagen, or “Teardrop” aerodynamic design; the experimental P-Wagen project racing car (P stood for Porsche), was designed according to the regulations of the 750 kg formula. The main regulation of this formula meant that the weight of the car without driver, fuel, oil, water and tire was not allowed to exceed 750 kg

.In June 1934, Porsche received a contract to design a “people’s car” (or Volkswagen), following on from his previous designs such as the 1931 Type 12 car designed for Zündapp.(the villain in Pixar’s film Cars 2 is based on a Zundapp Janus And the Zundapp type 12 looks like a VW Beetle) The first two prototype cars were completed in 1935. These were followed by several further pre-production batches during 1936 to 1939. During the war, production concentrated almost exclusively on the military Kübelwagen and Schwimmwagen variants. Mass production of the car, which later became known as the Beetle, commenced after the end of the war. The city is named Wolfsburg today and is still the headquarters of Volkswagen Group. Having garnered state funds It was agreed that it would be better for Mercedes Benz and Auto Union to develop their projects separately resulting in funds being split between Mercedes and Auto Union This highly annoyed Mercedes, who had already developed their Mercedes-Benz W125, and resulted in a fierce rivallry between the two companIes. In November 1945 after the war, Porsche was asked to continue the design of the Volkswagen, The company also started work on a new design, the Porsche 356, the first car to carry the Porsche brand. The Porsche family returned to Stuttgart in 1949 but had trouble restarting their business after the war. When Ferry Porsche eventually did resurrect the company he counted on series production figures of about 1,500. However it proved hugely popular and More than 78,000 Porsche 356s were manufactured in the following 17 years.Porsche was also contracted by Volkswagen for additional consulting work and received a royalty on every Volkswagen Beetle manufactured. This provided Porsche with a comfortable financial situation as more than 20 million Beetles were built.In November 1950, Porsche visited the Wolfsburg Volkswagen factory for the first time since the end of World War II and discussed the future of the VW Beetle which was already being produced in large numbers. Sadly Porsche suffered a stroke A few weeks later from which He did not fully recover, and died on 30 January 1951. During his life Porsce recieve many awards for his work, In 1937, Porsche was awarded the German National Prize for Art and Science, In 1996, Porsche was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame and in 1999 he posthumously won the award of Car Engineer of the Century.In 2010 an official memorial was also erected in Porsche’s birthplace in Vratislavice nad Nisou, Czech Republic, featuring a Porsche 356