Crystal Pen

2009年2月7日星期六

Led Pens

Jean-Marie Le Pen
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Jean-Marie Le Pen

Member of the European Parliamentfor France
Incumbent
Assumed office June 10, 2004
In office1984 – April 10, 2003
Born
June 20, 1928 (1928-06-20) (age 80)La Trinité-sur-Mer, Brittany, France
Nationality
France
Political party
National Front
Spouse
Jeanne-Marie Paschos
Children
Three daughters, including Marine Le Pen
Religion
Roman Catholic
Jean-Marie Le Pen (born June 20, 1928, La Trinité-sur-Mer, Brittany, France) is a French Nationalist politician who is founder and president of the Front National (National Front) party. Le Pen has run for the French presidency five times, including in 2002, when in a surprise upset he came second, polling more votes in the first round than the main left candidate, Lionel Jospin. Le Pen lost in the second round to Jacques Chirac. Le Pen again ran in the 2007 French presidential election and finished fourth. His 2007 campaign, at the age of 78 years and 9 months, makes him the oldest candidate for presidential office in France.
Le Pen focuses on immigration to France, the European Union, traditional culture, law and order and France's high rate of unemployment. He advocates immigration restrictions, the death penalty, raising incentives for homemakers, and euroscepticism. He strongly opposes same-sex marriage, euthanasia, and abortion.
Contents
1 Personal life and early career
2 Political career
2.1 1972-Present
3 Issues
3.1 Anti-Semitism, xenophobia and controversial statements
3.2 Prosecution concerning historical revisionism & Holocaust denial
3.3 Prosecution, allegations of torture and association with militarists
4 Comments on the Right
5 European Reform Treaty
6 Notes
7 See also
8 External links

Personal life and early career
Le Pen was born in a small seaside village in Brittany, the son of a fisherman but then orphaned as an adolescent (pupille de la nation, brought up by the state), when his father's boat was blown up by a mine in 1942. He was raised as a Roman Catholic and studied at the Jesuit high school François Xavier in Vannes, then in the lycée of Lorient.
Aged 16, he was turned down (because of his age) by Colonel Henri de La Vaissière (then representant of the Communist Youth) when he attempted, in November 1944, to join the French Forces of the Interior (FFI). He then entered the faculty of law in Paris, and started to sell in the street the monarchist Action française 's newspaper, Aspects de la France[3]. He was repeatedly convicted of assault (coups et blessures).[4] He became president of the Association corporative des étudiants en droit, an association of law students whose main occupation was to engage in street brawls against the "Cocos" (communists). He was excluded from this organisation in 1951.

Jean-Marie Le Pen, September 2005
After receiving his law diploma, he enlisted in the Army in the Foreign Legion in Indochina, where he arrived after the 1954 Dien Bien Phu Battle[4] (lost by France, and which prompted the President of the Council Pierre Mendès France to put an end to the war at the Geneva Conference). He was then sent to Suez (1956), but arrived only after the cease-fire.[4] He was then sent to Algeria (1957) as an intelligence officer. He has been accused of having engaged in torture, but he denied it, although he admitted knowing of its use.[4] After his time in the military, he studied political science and law at Paris II. His graduate thesis, submitted in 1971 by Jean-Marie Le Pen and Jean-Loup Vincent, was titled Le courant anarchiste en France depuis 1945 or "The anarchist movement in France since 1945".

Le Pen with his wife at a political raly in 2007
His marriage (June 29, 1960 - March 18, 1987) to Pierrette Lalanne resulted in three daughters; their daughters have given him nine granddaughters. Their break-up was somewhat dramatic, with his ex-wife posing nude in the French edition of Playboy to ridicule him.[4] Marie-Caroline, another of his daughters, would also break with Le Pen, following her husband to join Bruno Mégret, who split from the FN to found MNR, the rival Mouvement National Républicain (National Republican Movement). The youngest of Le Pen's daughters, Marine Le Pen, is a senior member of the Front National.
In 1977 Le Pen inherited a fortune from Hubert Lambert, son of the cement industrialist of the same name. Hubert Lambert was a political supporter of Le Pen, as well as being a monarchist, an alcoholic, and in poor health. Lambert's will provided 30 million francs (approximatively 5 million euros) to LePen, as well as his castle in Montretout, Saint-Cloud (the same castle had been owned by Madame de Pompadour until 1748).
In the early 1980s, Le Pen's personal security was assured by KO International Company, a subsidiary of VHP Security, a private security firm, and an alleged front organisation for SAC, the Service d'Action Civique (Civic Action Service), a Gaullist organisation. SAC allegedly employed figures with organized crime backgrounds and from the far-right movement.
On May 31, 1991, Jean-Marie Le Pen married Jeanne-Marie Paschos ("Jany"), of Greek descent. Born in 1933, Paschos was previously married to Belgian businessman Jean Garnier.

Political career

National advertisement in Marseille, predicting the now unrealised possibility of Jean-Marie Le Pen becoming President in 2007
Le Pen started his political career as the head of the student union in Toulouse. In 1953, a year before the beginning of the Algerian War, he contacted President Vincent Auriol, who approved Le Pen's proposed volunteer disaster relief project after a flood in the Netherlands. Within two days, there were 40 volunteers from his university, a group that would later help victims of an earthquake in Italy. In Paris in 1956, he was elected to the National Assembly as a member of Pierre Poujade's UDCA populist party. Le Pen, 28 years old, was the youngest member of the Assembly.
In 1957, he became the General Secretary of the National Front of Combatants, a veterans' organization, as well as the first French politician to nominate a Muslim candidate, Ahmed Djebbour, an Algerian, elected in 1957 as deputy of Paris. The next year, following his break with Poujade, Le Pen was re-elected to the National Assembly as a member of the Centre National des Indépendants et Paysans (CNIP) party, led by Antoine Pinay. Le Pen claimed that he had lost his left eye when he was savagely beaten during the 1958 election campaign. Testimonies suggest however that he was only wounded in the right eye and did not lose it. He lost the sight in his left eye years later, due to an illness (popular belief that he wears a glass eye is untrue). During the 1950s, Le Pen took a close interest in the Algerian war (1954-62) and the French defense budget.
Le Pen then directed the 1965 presidential campaign of far-right candidate Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, who obtained 5.19% of the votes. He insisted on the rehabilitation of the Collaborationists, declaring that:
"Was General de Gaulle more brave than the Marshall Pétain in the occupied zone? This isn't sure. It was much easier to resist in London than to resist in France."
In 1962, he lost his seat at the Assembly. He created the Serp (Société d’études et de relations publiques) firm, a company involved in the music industry, which produced both chorals of the CGT trade-union and songs of the Popular Front and Nazi marches. The firm was condemned in 1968 for "praise of war crime and complicity" after the diffusion of songs from the Third Reich.

1972-Present

Jean-Marie Le Pen speaking at the Front National's annual tribute to Joan of Arc in Paris (May 1, 2007)
In 1972, Le Pen founded the Front National (FN) party, along with former OAS member Jacques Bompard, former Collaborationist Roland Gaucher and others nostalgics of Vichy France, neo-nazi pagans, Catholic fundamentalists, etc. Le Pen presented himself for the first time in the 1974 presidential election, obtaining 0.74%.In 1976, his Parisian flat (he lived at that time in his castle of Montretout in Saint-Cloud) was dynamited. The affair never was elucidated. Le Pen then didn't manage to obtain the 500 signatures from "grand electors" (grands électeurs, mayors, etc.) necessary to present himself to the 1981 presidential election, won by the candidate of the Socialist Party (PS), François Mitterrand.
Criticizing immigration and taking advantage of the economic crisis striking France, and the world, since the 1973 oil crisis, Le Pen's party managed to increase its votes in the 1980s, starting in the municipal elections of 1983. His popularity has been greatest in the south of France. The FN obtained 10 percent at the 1984 European elections. 34 FN deputies entered the Assembly after the 1986 elections, which were won by the right wing, bringing Jacques Chirac to Matignon in the first cohabitation (that is, of the combination of a right-wing Prime minister, Chirac, with a socialist President, Mitterrand).
In 1984 and 1999, Le Pen won a seat in the European Parliament. In 1988 he lost a reelection bid for the Parliament of France in the 8th District of Bouches-du-Rhône. He was defeated in the second round by Socialist Marius Masse.In 1992 and 1998 he was elected to the regional council of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur.
Le Pen ran in the French presidential elections in 1974, 1988, 1995, 2002 and 2007. He did not run for office in 1981, having failed to gather the necessary 500 signatures of elected officials. In the presidential elections of 2002, Le Pen obtained 16.86 percent of the votes in the first round of voting. This was enough to qualify him for the second round, as a result of the poor showing by the Socialist candidate and incumbent prime minister Lionel Jospin and the scattering of votes among 15 other candidates. This was a major political event, both nationally and internationally, as it was the first time someone with such extremist views had qualified for the second round of the French presidential elections. There was a widespread stirring of national public opinion, and more than one million people in France took part in street rallies; slogans such as "vote for the crook, not the fascist" were heard in an expression of fierce opposition to Le Pen's ideas. Le Pen was then soundly defeated in the second round, when incumbent president Jacques Chirac obtained 82 percent of the votes, thus securing the biggest majority in the history of the Fifth Republic.
In the 2004 regional elections, Le Pen intended to run for office in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region but was prevented from doing so because he did not meet the conditions for being a voter in that region: he neither lived there, nor was registered as a taxpayer there.
In recent years, Le Pen has tried to soften his image, with mixed success. He has manoeuvred his daughter Marine into a prominent position, a move that angered many inside the National Front, who worry about the emergence of a possible Le Pen family dynasty

HB Pencils

epoxy sticker

Gateway AnyKey
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The Gateway AnyKey is a programmable PC keyboard that was sold with desktop computers from the Gateway 2000 company roughly from 1990 to 1995. It was manufactured in at least five known versions and incarnations by Tucson, Arizona-based Maxi Switch, now a subsidiary of LiteOn Technology Corporation. The AnyKey is no longer manufactured, with the latest dated model available marked 1996. Maxi Switch, Gateway, and LiteOn currently do not offer any product labeled as or comparable to the AnyKey.
The AnyKey keyboard is easily distinguished from other generic keyboards by an extra double column of F keys on the left side, a unique eight directional arrow key pad as opposed to the traditional inverted T, and a quartet of extra keys directly above the numeric pad that control the programmable aspects of the keyboard. They are labeled “Program Macro”, “Suspend Macro”, “Repeat Rate”, and “Remap”, reading left to right. All versions of the AnyKey are white or very light gray with some keys (notably the programming keys, extra function keys, and arrows) in a darker gray.
Contents
1 Features and construction
2 Programming
3 Features
4 Versions
5 Value
6 References

Features and construction

A typical Gateway AnyKey keyboard.
The AnyKey is a 124 key PC keyboard, including the usual complement of 101 keys in addition to others. Some revisions of its design predate the advent of the “Windows” keyboard and therefore lack the three extra keys present on such keyboards, and are replaced with extra keys for the asterisk (*) and either a backslash (\) or a hash (#), depending on the intended locale.
The keyboard includes 12 extra F keys, four programming keys, and four additional arrow keys for diagonal input, as well as one blank key in the center of the eight way arrow key area that normally acts as a second space bar but can be programmed. Also, the AnyKey has a fourth indicator light to the right of the normal Num Lock, Caps Lock, and Scroll Lock lights labeled “Program”.
Since the design of the AnyKey predates the "multimedia PC," it lacks the additional multimedia keys present on many keyboards included with brand name computers like CD controls and volume knobs.
A unique feature of the AnyKey is its hardware programmability. The keyboard contains an internal controller as well as an EEPROM chip that can store user-defined macros. Any key on the keyboard can be programmed to contain a macro of arbitrary length or can be programmed to act like any other key on the keyboard (remapped). This is done on the hardware level inside the keyboard's controller itself. No driver software is required to use the AnyKey's programming functionality, as the keyboard's own controller dictates which keypress codes are sent to the attached computer. A utility for MS-DOS exists to quickly remap the entire keyboard to a predefined configuration or save its current configuration to a file, but it is not required to use or program the keyboard. The AnyKey's EEPROM memory will retain its data even if the keyboard is unplugged indefinitely, so settings and programming aren't lost if the computer is powered down, unplugged, or if the keyboard is unplugged or moved to a different computer.
The controller board inside the Anykey contains six integrated circuit packages (“chips”) in addition to various signal regulation hardware including 15 diodes, 11 capacitors, and nine resistors of unknown specific function in addition to four green LED's for signalling purposes of (left to right)“NUM LOCK”, “CAPS LOCK”, “SCROLL LOCK”, and “PROGRAM”. The chips included are an Intel P8052AH microcontroller, an Atmel AT28C16 16 kilobit EEPROM chip, and four Fairchild Semiconductor Decoder/Demultiplexer chips of various descriptions.
The AnyKey is available in AT and PS/2 style configurations, and either is compatible with any AT or PS/2 keyboard compatible computer. Additionally, an AT to PS/2 adapter (or vice versa) can be used to attach either type of keyboard to either type of system – The AnyKey includes no quirks that interfere with the use of the adapter. Its design predates the implementation of the USB standard. No USB AnyKey was ever produced. However, a USB to PS/2 converter will allow the AnyKey to be used with modern or "legacy free" systems.
The AnyKey is constructed of a plastic chassis that is large compared to most modern keyboards (partially owing to the extra columns of keys on the left side) and also slightly thicker than most keyboard casings of the present era. It is rounded on all corners and edges, with an overall rectangular shape. As with many keyboards, there are two plastic feet that can be flipped down from the upper corners to tilt the keyboard into a suitable typing position. There is also a long central plastic foot, on some versions, that can be flipped down to tilt the keyboard to a less severe angle than the two outside feet.
The AnyKey uses rubber dome type keyswitches, with all the switches and contact points moulded into a single sheet. The keyswitch layer contacts a single flexible membrane that detects all keypresses and directs them to the controller board via a pair of flexible edge connectors. While the AnyKey is branded as a Gateway product, the membrane layer clearly bears the inscription “Maxi Switch Inc,” revealing the true maker of the hardware. This membrane is backed by a metal plate approximately a sixteenth of an inch thick which serves to hold the membrane rigid and in place as well as giving the keyboard considerable heft. Held in place on top of the rubber dome layer is a plastic block that holds the key pillars which in turn hold the key caps themselves. The key pillars are individually replaceable but cannot be removed without dismantling the keyboard to separate the rubber dome layer from the plastic support layer and the removal of the latter from the assembly. The key caps are held onto the pillars via friction with cross shaped pegs. The key caps are easily removed for cleaning or rearrangement, as all keys on the keyboard use the same attachment method and with the exception of the Space Bar, Enter, Shift, Tab, Control, Alt, and Caps Lock keys are all the same size. In this manner, keys that have been remapped (like the commonly remapped arrow keys) can also be physically moved to the correct location on the board.
The AnyKey also has a user programmable repeat rate (the rate at which a key will repeat its function on the computer if it is held down) that is handled by the controller inside the board and therefore overrides the BIOS or operating system controlled repeat rate on the attached computer. The repeat rate is set by pressing the “Repeat Rate” key and then one of the top row F keys, with F1 being the slowest rate and F8 being the fastest.

Programming
The AnyKey keyboard is extensively programmable. This takes two forms: Remapping, and macro programming. The only keys on the AnyKey that cannot be programmed in at least some way are those used to control the programming itself – Program Macro, Suspend Macro, Repeat Rate, and Remap. Any other key on the keyboard including letters, numbers, arrow keys, and even special keys like modifiers, Enter, and the Space Bar can be programmed.
A key can be remapped (copied to a different location on the keyboard) by pressing the Remap key once (depending on the revision of the keyboard, the Ctrl key may also need to be held down), pressing the key to be copied, and then pressing the new key that will serve as the new destination for the old key's command. The Program light on the keyboard will flash as long as it is awaiting remapping commands. Multiple keys can be remapped without pressing Remap again – The Program light will continue blinking after one key has been remapped and the keyboard will await more remapping commands with the same method as before. On each key press the Program light will pause flashing momentarily to signal that a keypress has been registered. Pressing Remap again before completing a remapping cancels the operation. Pressing Remap after at least one remapping has been completed will save all the remappings but will cancel an incomplete one if it is in progress.
After remapping, the old key will retain its original function even after being remapped elsewhere, effectively creating two copies of the same key. After it is remapped somewhere else, the original or 'old' key can be remapped to a different function or have a macro programmed to it. Pressing the Remap key and then pressing the same key twice (known as “remapping a key to itself”) resets it to its original function.
Any key can also be programmed with a macro. Macros are multiple presses of various keys in sequence of arbitrary length. The “extra” F keys on the left of the keyboard are essentially reserved for having macros programmed to them, though they mirror the function of the F keys along the top of the keyboard before they are programmed. The keyboard treats both sets of F keys as separate, however – Remapping or programming one of the F keys will not change the function of its counterpart.
A macro is programmed to a key by pressing the “Program Macro” button once (depending on the revision of the keyboard, the Ctrl key may also need to be held down), pressing the key that will have the macro assigned to it once, and then entering the commands to be programmed. Any sequence of key presses is valid input, including letters, numbers, keys used in conjunction with shift, alt, and control, F keys, cursor movement, remapped keys, and even other keys programmed with macros. The Program light flashes as long as the keyboard is accepting programming input. It pauses momentarily when the key to be assigned the macro is pressed to indicate that the keypress was picked up. Pressing Program Macro for a second time ends the programming session and saves the macro to the target key. Pressing it again before entering any programming input cancels the operation. A key can be cleared of its macro by pressing Program Macro and then pressing the key twice.
Pressing a programmed key will “play back” all the keypresses that were programmed into it at the current repeat rate of the keyboard.
The Program light normally remains solidly on or off depending on whether the keyboard is set to use macros, which can be toggled by pressing the Suspend Macro key. The state of the Program light does not reflect whether there are any macros programmed into the keyboard, merely whether the keyboard is in macro mode.
Pressing the Suspend Macro key will cause the Program light to go out and will cause all keys programmed with macros to behave with their usual functions instead of their programmed macros. Keys that have been remapped do not reset themselves while macros are suspended. Pressing Suspend Macro again relights the Program light and restores the macros to all programmed keys.
Holding the Control and Alt keys and pressing the Suspend Macro key clears all of the keyboard's programming. The Program light will flash while the keyboard erases its memory. Afterwards, it will go dark and all keys will be reset to their original function, all macros deleted, and all remappings reset. Holding down the Suspend Macro key while powering on the computer will also reset all keys to their original function

Eraser Pen

Eraser
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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For other uses, see Eraser (disambiguation).

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2007)

Common erasers
An eraser or rubber is an article of stationery that is used for removing pencil and sometimes pen writings. Erasers have a rubbery consistency and are often white, brown or pink, although modern materials allow them to be made in any color. Many pencils are equipped with an eraser on one end. Typical erasers are made from synthetic rubber, but more expensive or specialized erasers can also contain vinyl, plastic, or gum-like materials. Other, cheaper erasers can be made out of synthetic soy-based gum.
Contents
1 History
2 Types
3 References
3.1 Notes
3.2 Bibliography
4 See also
5 External links

History

A pencil eraser.
Prior to the invention of the rubber eraser, tablets of wax were used to erase lead/charcoal marks from paper. It has been claimed that crustless bread was, in the past, commonly used as an eraser; this is possible, but the bread would disintegrate, and would at that time most likely have been too costly to replace.
On April 15, 1770, Joseph Priestley described a vegetable gum which had the ability to rub out pencil marks: "I have seen a substance excellently adapted to the purpose of wiping from paper the mark of black lead pencil." He dubbed the substance "rubber". ,
In 1770, Edward Nairne, an English engineer, is credited with developing the first widely-marketed rubber eraser for an inventions competition. He reportedly sold natural rubber erasers for the high price of 3 shillings per half-inch cube. According to Nairne, he inadvertently picked up a piece of rubber instead of breadcrumbs, discovered rubber's erasing properties, and began selling rubber erasers. Incidentally, this was the first practical application of the substance in Europe, and rubbing out the pencil marks gave it its English name.
However, rubber in its raw form shared the same inconveniences as bread, since it was perishable and would go bad over time. In 1839, inventor Charles Goodyear discovered the process of vulcanization, a method that would cure rubber and make it a durable material. Rubber erasers became common with this advent of vulcanization.
On March 30, 1858, Hymen Lipman of Philadelphia, USA, received the first patent for attaching an eraser to the end of a pencil. It was later invalidated because it was determined to be simply a composite of two devices rather than an entirely new product .

Types

Cap erasers.

Two kneaded erasers. A new eraser is on the left, and an older eraser on the right. The older eraser is darker due to the graphite and charcoal dust that has become incorporated into the eraser.
Erasers are often found on the end of a pencil opposite the graphite point. The type of eraser often attached to pencils is usually pink, red, or green, and has a smooth, rubbery texture. Erasers also come in many different colors to match the pencil to which they are attached, especially for novelty purposes. Pulverized pumice is blended into this type of eraser to make it abrasive. It is good for most erasing purposes, though it tends to smear and can damage the paper if used too heavily. It leaves eraser residue that must be brushed away; care must be taken in brushing away residue, as the eraser particles can leave marks on the paper. Some erasers do not erase well because they lack the flexibility to clear the paper of the pencil markings.
Another eraser type that is popular with artists is the art gum eraser, made of soft, coarse rubber. It is especially suited to removing large areas, and does not damage the paper. As gum erasers tend to crumble as they are used, this type leaves a lot of eraser residue, however, and is not very precise. Many artists use a broad brush to sweep away the loose eraser residue. Art gum erasers are commonly tan or brown.
The kneaded eraser (or kneaded rubber eraser) is also well-known. It is usually made of a grey or white pliable material that resembles putty or chewing gum. It functions by "absorbing" and "picking up" graphite and charcoal particles. It does not wear away and leave behind eraser residue, thus it lasts much longer than other erasers. Kneaded erasers can be shaped with the fingers and used for precision erasing, to create highlights, or for detailing work. It is commonly used to remove light charcoal and light graphite marks in subtractive drawing techniques. However, it is not well-suited to completely erasing large areas, and may smear or stick if it becomes too warm. Though it does not wear away like other erasers, it can become exhausted, unable to absorb any more graphite or charcoal in which case it will start to smear and actually make marks instead of erasing them.
Soft vinyl erasers have a plastic-like texture and erase more cleanly than standard pink erasers. They are somewhat softer and non-abrasive, making them less likely to damage canvas or paper. They are prone to cause smearing when erasing large areas or dark marks, so are more frequently used for erasing light marks and precision erasing. Engineers favor this type of eraser for work on technical drawings due to their gentleness on paper. Vinyl erasers are commonly white.
Another type of eraser is used specifically for marks on a chalkboard or whiteboard. Rather than being rubbery or gummy like pencil erasers, it is a hand-held wooden or plastic block with a dark felt pad on one side.
Erasers come in several shapes and sizes. In addition to those that come attached to pencils, they may also be rectangular blocks (block and wedge eraser), or conical caps that can slip onto the end of a pencil (cap eraser). A barrel or click eraser is a device shaped like a pencil, but instead of being filled with pencil lead, its barrel contains a retractable cylinder of eraser material (most commonly vinyl). Novelty erasers are made in a wide variety of shapes, colors, and designs to suit their themes (such as musical notes, animals, confectionery), and they are typically acquired more for their decorative nature than for any practical use.

Electric Organizer

Pacific Gas and Electric Company
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For the 1970s rock music band, see Pacific Gas & Electric (band).
"PG&E" redirects here. For the Portland, Oregon electric utility, see Portland General Electric.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company

Type
Public (NYSE: PCG)
Founded
1905
Headquarters
San Francisco, California, USA
Industry
ElectricityNatural Gas
Products
ElectricityNatural Gas
Market cap
US$ 14.92 Billion (As of Sep 12, 2008)
Revenue
▲ US$13.237 Billion (2007)
Operating income
▲ US$2.114 Billion (2007)
Net income
▲ US$1.006 Billion (2007)
Employees
20,000 (2007)
Websit
www.pge.com
The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), (NYSE: PCG) is the utility that provides natural gas and electricity to most of Northern California. The southern part of the state is generally served by Southern California Edison for power and natural gas from Southern California Gas. PG&E was founded in 1905 and is currently headquartered in the Pacific Gas & Electric Building in San Francisco.
Contents
1 History
1.1 San Francisco Gas
1.2 San Francisco Gas Light
1.3 San Francisco Gas and Electric
1.4 Pacific Gas and Electric company 1905
1.5 Streetcars
1.6 North American Company
1.7 Postwar era
1.8 Bankruptcy
2 Generation Portfolio
2.1 Hydroelectric facilities
2.2 Nuclear facilities
2.3 Fossil facilities
2.4 Solar Facilities
3 PG&E Power Content
4 Management
5 PG&E and the Environment
6 The legal case in Hinkley (1993-1996)
7 Diversity
8 Fortune 500 2008
9 References and footnotes
10 See also
11 External links
//

History

San Francisco Gas
In the 1850s, manufactured gas was being introduced as means of lighting for the first time and coal gasification works were being built in the larger eastern American cities. San Francisco pioneer foundryman and blacksmith Peter Donahue and his brothers established a foundry below North Beach, and later in the south of Market area. The foundry would become the Union Iron Works, the greatest industrial concern in 19th century San Francisco. Donahue learned all he could about gas manufacturing and with his brother James and a young engineer named Joseph G. Eastland incorporated the San Francisco Gas Company on August 31, 1852. The original location for the gas works was bounded by First, Fremont, Howard and Natoma streets south of Market, on the then shore of the San Francisco Bay. On the night of February 11, 1854, the streets of San Francisco were for the first time lighted by gas, and a banquet was held at the Oriental hotel. In a year, the company had 12 miles (19 km) of street mains, thousands of gas streetlights, two gas holders at First and Howard with a combined capacity of 160,000 cubic feet (4,500 m3) and a monopoly of city gasification contracts. The cost of gas was billed at 15 dollars per thousand cubic feet, where no meters were installed, the price was estimated from the size of the burners. Shortly thereafter, the Citizens Gas Company was given a fifty year franchise by the state legislature but when the company was built and ready to deliver gas, it sold out to the San Francisco Gas Company.
In April 1870, the City Gas Company was organized and built its works on the Potrero Point shoreline. Another company, the Metropolitan Gas Company, was established but was not a success, and it was quickly purchased by the San Francisco Gas Company.

San Francisco Gas Light
All these companies were merged with larger infusions of capital into the San Francisco Gas Light company in 1873. A rival company, the Central Gas Company, came into existence in 1882 and the rate for gas went as low 0.90 cents a thousand cubic feet. The Central and the Pacific Gas Improvement Company were merged into the San Francisco Gas and Electric Company, (SFG&E Co.) September 1, 1903.
Rapid technological improvements in the processes of manufacturing gas were immediately adopted by the company. When petroleum was produced in California, the manufacture of water gas, then in general use in eastern and midwest states, began in San Francisco.
Water gas was first made from anthracite coal brought around Cape Horn from Swansea in Wales and enriched with California petroleum. The first water gas works, a thoroughly modern plant, was established at Potrero Point and the manufacture of water gas was a success due to the increased amount of petroleum available that reduced costs. The company then acquired land in North Beach at Bay, Laguna and Webster streets, and in 1891, the North Beach Gas Works was built. For many years this facility, with its 2 million cubic feet (57,000 m3) gas holder, was considered the finest gas works in the world. The original plant at Howard Street was dismantled.
Circa 1890 they also built a small electrical generator at the Potrero Point site, a first in California. This site would later become the Potrero Generating Station.

San Francisco Gas and Electric
In December, 1896, the San Francisco Gas Light Company merged with the Edison Light and Power Company under the new title San Francisco Gas and Electric Company and this company existed until 1903 and then dissolved.
Other companies that started in the business in active competition but eventually merged into the SFG&E co. were the Equitable Gas Light Company and the Independent Electric Light and Power and the Independent Gas and Power company, founded by Claus Spreckels, the king of California sugar.

Pacific Gas and Electric company 1905
The company known as Pacific Gas and Electric incorporated on October 10, 1905, as a consolidation of more than two dozen power and water concerns around the state. PG&E went on to consolidate power in northern California and by 1952 represented 520 companies merged.
By 1906, the exclusive use of petroleum for manufactured gas was catching on and a 4,000,000 cubic feet gas-oil unit was built at the Potrero Gas Works. A similar unit had been built at the Martin Station in Visiticion Valley on the San Mateo border and was connected to the Potrero works by a 12-inch (300 mm) high pressure pipe for use in San Francisco. At around the same time, hydroelectric power was established in California at the Colgate power plant on the Yuba River which began to deliver power for agriculture. In 1905, Pacific Gas and Electric Company was formed by a merger of the SFG&E Co. and the California Gas and Electric Corporation. The 1906 earthquake destroyed the North Beach Gas Works but the Potrero works were unaffected and along with the Martin Station, supplied the city after the Great fire. In 1912 PG&E began installing meters to free itself from the previous flat rate billing scheme.
PG&E began delivering natural gas to San Francisco and northern California in 1930 through the longest pipeline in the world, connecting the Texas gas fields to northern California with compressor stations that included cooling towers every 300 miles (480 km), at Topock on the state line, and near the town of Hinkley, California. With the introduction of natural gas, the company began retiring its polluting gas manufacturing facilities, though it kept some plants on standby.

Streetcars
1906 also marked the year that PG&E purchased the Sacramento Electric, Gas & Railway Company. The history of the PG&E streetcar lines in Sacramento goes back to the Sacramento City Street Railway, a 5-foot (1.5 m) gauge horsecar railway that operated 9 miles (14 km) of street railway in Sacramenato in the late 1800s. The Sacramento Street Railway was purchased by the Sacramento Electric, Power and Light Company Electric Railway. In 1896, the Sacramento Electric, Power & Light Company Electric Railway was purchased by the Sacramento Electric, Gas & Railway Company. In 1906, PG&E acquired the line and in 1915 PG&E operated the line under the PG&E name. PG&E's streetcars had lines such as the "#6 - Oak Park Line". In 1943, PG&E sold the lines to Sacramento City Lines which ended up in the hands of the National City Lines. National City Lines converted several streetcar lines in that era to bus service and the track was abandoned on January 4, 1947.

crystal sticker

Issaquah Middle School
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Issaquah Middle School

Location
400 1st Ave SE
Issaquah, Washington 98027
Information
Type
Public intermediate school
School district
Issaquah School District
Principal
Corrine DeRosaFaculty
41
Students
895
Color(s)
Maroon and Grey
Mascot
Panther
Website
http://www.ims.issaquah.wednet.edu/
Issaquah Middle School is a middle school serving students in grades 6-8, in Issaquah, Washington and Bellevue, Washington as part of the Issaquah School District. Located in the vicinity of Issaquah Middle School is the Issaquah Community Center and Issaquah Creek, as well as the older portion of downtown Issaquah along Front Street.Students at Issaquah Middle School feed in from Cougar Ridge Elementary, Clark Elementary, Issaquah Valley Elementary, as well as some of the students that attend Sunset Elementary and Grand Ridge Elementary. The students continue to Pacific Cascade Freshman Campus for their freshman year (until fall of 2010) and Issaquah High School for the rest of their high school caree. It is also part of the KING-5 TV weather network giving weather data of the city of Issaquah.
Contents
1 History
2 Academics
3 Student Life
4 Sports, Arts and Extracurricular Activities
5 PTSA
6 WASL Test Results
7 References
8 External links

History
Issaquah Middle School was constructed as the first middle school of the Issaquah School District and opened with the name Issaquah Junior High School in 1955; following a magnitude 6.5 earthquake that struck the greater Puget Sound region on April 29th, 1965. About three decades later, the school was remodeled for two years of "live-in, learn-in" conditions with the remodel being completed in 1999.

Academics
The average class size of the school is 30 students based on the size of the average required eighth grade English clas.Majority of the teachers at Issaquah Middle have 1 to 5 years of teaching experience with 71 percent of the teachers holding Master's and Ph.D degrees. The school offers a "highly capable" program called Humanities Plus which is a block class containing history and English curriculum for which 174 students are enrolled (as of 2008); an ESL Program for which 23 students are enrolled (as of 2008); and a special education program for which 80 students are enrolled (as of 2008). Issaquah Middle also offers high school credit foreign language classes and high school credit] mathematics classes. Issaquah has also introduced Smartboards to a majority of the classrooms as well as LCD projectors and document cameras.

Student Life
As of 2008, Issaquah Middle School has a WEB "Where Everybody Belongs" program which assists incoming sixth graders to adjust to the new environment of middle school. Since 2005, the school is involved in the Green Schools Program of King County, Washington which was adopted by the Issaquah School District to reduce outgoing waste from the school by increasing recycling and decreasing the usage of the garbage dumpster. Specifically, Issaquah Middle decreased its collection frequency/size of garbage dumpster saving nearly $17000 when combined with the totals of four other Issaquah district schools.

Sports, Arts and Extracurricular Activities
Issaquah Middle School has several sports teams which include basketball, cross country, softball, track, wrestling for boys and basketball, gymnastics, track, volleyball for girls[15]. Track is the main sporting event and the school has won a number of trophies over the years. Head coach, and beloved teacher, John Mejlaender, along with his wife Sarah Mejalaender, usually coach the team, though this year they are out as their twins will be born, to be named "Yo" and "Yo". the names were selected as a part of an all school competition to name the twins, and Mr. Mejlaender's 4th period class came up with the winning two names/The school also offers fine arts programs which include band, choir, orchestra, drama, photography, drawing-painting, ceramics. Mixed Media Art, and Graphic design. The members of the IMS band, chorus, and orchestra travel annually to Disneyland for a recording session as well as public performance. Extracurricular activities offered include Chess club, Junior National Honor Society, Math Olympiad, Robotics, Homework Club, Scrapbook/Sticker Club, Jazz Band, Crystal Voices, Art Club, Latino Club.

PTSA
Issaquah Middle School's PTSA has provided the school with more than $15000 in teacher grants, scholarships, and programs which include the introduction of ACTIVboards in classrooms and the annual eighth grade trip to the Junior Achievement Financial Park where the students learn real-world skills. The PTSA also provides the school with numerous hours of volunteering at school activities and services. Such an example of the volunteer work is the Walk About program. It is the first kind of program in the district containing nearly 120 parent volunteers who provide adult supervision on campus grounds before school, during lunches, and at the end of the school day.

Crystal Pen

The Crystals
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This article is about the singing group. For the entertainment district at CityCenter, see The Crystals

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (January 2009)
The Crystals were a New York City singing group and are considered one of the defining acts of the girl group era of the first half of the 1960s. Their 1961—1964 chart hits — including "Uptown", "He's A Rebel", "Da Doo Ron Ron (When He Walked Me Home)" and "Then He Kissed Me" — featured three successive female lead singers and were all produced by Phil Spector.
Contents
1 History
1.1 Formation and signing to Philles
1.2 The "Replacement" Crystals
1.3 The "Let's Dance The Screw" Saga
1.4 The "Real" Crystals Return
1.5 Mounting tension and break-up
2 Trivia and cultural use
3 Albums
3.1 Standard albums
3.2 Compilations
4 Singles
4.1 Barbara Alston on lead vocals
4.2 Darlene Love on lead vocals
4.3 Dolores "LaLa" Brooks on lead vocals
5 Footnotes
6 External links

History

Formation and signing to Philles
In the early 1960s, Barbara Alston, Mary Thomas, Dolores "Dee Dee" Kenniebrew, Myrna Girard and Patricia "Patsy" Wright formed The Crystals through the help of Benny Wells, Barbara's uncle. Soon, the quintet signed with Phil Spector's label Philles Records. By default, Spector chose Alston to be the group's lead singer, which made her uncomfortable since she had a fear of singing in front of audiences.
Their first hit was 1961's "There's No Other (Like My Baby)" (see 1961 in music). Originally the B-side to "Oh Yeah, Maybe Baby" (featuring Wright on lead), the wistful gospel-pop ballad (co-written by Spector and Leroy Bates, with Barbara Alston on vocals) reached number 20 in the Billboard chart, registering as an auspicious debut for Spector's Phillies label.
Brill Building songwriters Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil's "Uptown" gave the girls their second radio hit. Ethnically flavoured with flamenco guitar and castanets, the more uptempo "Uptown" featured Alston once again emoting convincingly over a boy, though this time with class issues woven into the story. After the success of "Uptown", a pregnant Girard was replaced by Dolores "LaLa" Brooks.
The touchy subject matter of the next single — 1962's "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)" (written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin and sung by Alston) — resulted in limited airplay, never reaching Billboard's Hot 100. The track enjoys a cult following.

The "Replacement" Crystals
Soon after "He Hit Me" flopped, Phil Spector began recording singer Darlene Love and her backing group The Blossoms under the name "The Crystals". Legend has it that the real Crystals were not able to travel from New York to Los Angeles fast enough to suit the LA-based Spector, who wanted to quickly record writer Gene Pitney's "He's a Rebel" before anyone else could release a version. The Crystals were unavailable, but Love and the Blossoms were also based in L.A., so Spector recorded and released their version under The Crystals' banner. (Other sources claim that Spector's haste in recording the track was simply because he was enthusastic about the song, and that he was unaware of any competing versions -- depsite the fact that Vicki Carr was recording "He's A Rebel" nearly simultaneously with Spector.)
The song had originally been offered to The Shirelles, who turned it down because of the anti-establishment lyrics. It marked a shift in girl group thematic material, where the singer loves a "bad boy", a theme that would be amplified by later groups (especially The Shangri-Las' "Leader of the Pack").
"He's A Rebel" is perhaps the Crystals' best-remembered song, and one of the most enduring of the girl group genre.[citation needed] It was also their only US #1 hit. Their follow-up single, "He's Sure the Boy I Love", in actuality also featured Love and The Blossoms. It reached #11 on the Billboard chart, and features a classic spoken intro by Darlene Love.

The "Let's Dance The Screw" Saga
The next single credited to The Crystals is one of the rarest -- and also possibly the strangest -- in rock music history. Reports vary as to the actual motivation behind the recording, but most agree that Phil Spector was looking for a way to annoy former business partner Lester Sill. What he came up with was a nearly six-minute song called "Let's Dance The Screw - Part I", which would be unplayable on 1963 radio. The record featured simple instrumentation (very much unlike Spector's famous Wall of Sound production style), repetitive lyrics, and Spector himself intoning the lyric "Dance The Screw" numerous times in a deadpan monotone. (The B-side, Part II, was more of the same.) The Crystals sang the song's repetitive verses, though it is unclear if these singers were the 'real' Crystals or The Blossoms. Incidentally, some accounts mention that Spector's lawyer is actually the man intoning "Dance The Screw."
The recording was never released commercially as a single, and only a few copies are known to exist (all marked D.J. COPY - NOT FOR SALE). The record was apparently only created to be a bizarre sort of joke at Sill's expense, who was soon to leave the Philles label, as a single copy was specially delivered to him in early 1963. Both parts of the song have since been released on CD. Further information about this strange recording can be found at snopes.com

The "Real" Crystals Return
Though it's unclear as to the level of their participation in "Let's Dance The Screw", the 'real' Crystals definitely began recording again under their own name in 1963. However, Thomas had departed to get married, only to join another mildly successful group, The Butterflys, along with another original Crystal, Myrna Girard. This reduced the group to a quartet with Barbara Alston on lead. Alston, known for her shyness and stage fright, was never comfortable with being out front, stepped down from the lead spot giving it to Brooks. According to Brooks, she had been doing Alston's leads in their live shows for a while.
After "Let's Dance The Screw", the group's next release was the classic "Da Doo Ron Ron." According to Darlene Love, the track was originally recorded by The Blossoms, with Love on lead vocal. Prior to release, Spector erased Love's lead vocal and replaced it with a vocal by LaLa Brooks, although he kept the Blossoms' backing vocals in place. [If you listen closely to the bottom note, you can hear Cher's unmistakable voice beefing up the backing vocals.] Allegedly, Spector has erased her lead vocal after she had asked for a contract instead of simply receiving session fees. The song was a top 10 hit in both the US and the UK, as was the follow-up single "Then He Kissed Me" the first Crystals single since "He Hit Me" to feature all members of the Crystals as a definite group.
Both "Da Doo Ron Ron" and "Then He Kissed Me" were penned by Spector with Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich.

Mounting tension and break-up
Despite the steady flow of hit singles, tensions between Spector and the Crystals mounted. Already unhappy with having been replaced by Love and company on two singles, The Crystals were even more upset when in 1964, Spector began focusing much of his time on his other girl group The Ronettes. As well, there were disputes about royalties, with The Crystals feeling that Spector was withholding royalty money that was owed to them.
Two failed Crystals singles followed before the band left Spector's Philles Records for United Artists Records later in 1964. "Little Boy", which reached #92, was a Wall Of Sound production that in hindsight was possibly overdone, the vocals beign hard to distinguish from the background music. "All Grown Up," their final Philles single (of which two versions exist) only reached #98.
1964 also saw the departure of Wright who was replaced by Frances Collins, a dancer who they had met while touring; toward the end of that year Alston departed leaving the group a trio. As a trio, they recorded two singles for United Artists, "My Place" and "You Can't Tie a Good Girl Down". One more single was released by Barbara, Dee Dee and Mary on the tiny Michelle Records in 1967 ("Ring-a-Ting-a-Ling"). They disbanded in 1967 (see 1967 in music). They reunited in 1971 (see 1971 in music) and still perform today. Kenniebrew is the only original Crystal who remained active throughout their touring from the seventies to the present. Dee Dee carries on The Crystals legacy by performing with dynamic vocalists Patricia Pritchett-Lewis (Member since 2005) and is Melissa MelSoulTree Antoinette (Member since 2002).

Trivia and cultural use
"Then He Kissed Me" is the opening song to which Elisabeth Shue dances around her bedroom in Adventures in Babysitting (1987); it is the song in which Ray Liotta and Lorraine Bracco enter the Copacabana on their first real date in the movie Goodfellas (1990); and it is used during the "Kiss Cam" during 'Homer and Marge Turn a Double Play' on The Simpsons (2006). It was also covered by Asobi Seksu and used on their live album.
Crystal is the name of one of the girl group-inspired street urchin characters in the musical Little Shop of Horrors, along with Chiffon and Ronnette.
Amy Winehouse has citied their song "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)" as an influence when writing her acclaimed second album Back to Black.
"All Grown Up"___ the track on the Crystals C.D. (the C.D.supervised by Spector) is a much different arrangement of the song than the original single.