Windy Hill Open Space Preserve - 5 Sept 2015
~11 miles trail (loop) in the Windy Hill Open Space Preserve
Windy Hill Hike
Foggy afternoon hike in Portola Valley
Music: DJ Pretentious - Get Lucky
New Peninsula Open Space Preserve Readies For Public Opening
Thousands of untouched acres of open space in San Mateo County were set to be opened to the public this Friday, the La Honda Creek Open Space Preserve. Kiet Do reports. (11/29/17)
Skyline Ridge Open Space Preserve - Alpine Pond
Wheelchair accessible trail leading to Alpine Pond in Skyline Ridge Open Space Preserve. April 2012.
158 Wayside Road, Portola Valley CA 94028, USA
158 Wayside Road, Portola Valley CA 94028, USA
Billy McNair Coldwell Banker 650.862.3266 McNairGroup.com
View my inventory:
View Interactive Tour:
Property Details
158 Wayside Rd, Portola Valley, CA 94028
Tucked away on a quiet street in the Portola Valley School District, this 4 bedroom, 2 bath residence is defined by its unique wooded ambiance balanced with the livability of a contemporary family home.
Mature camellias, stone terraces and a freshly painted façade offer a picturesque first impression. The entry stair ascends to the voluminous living room, a breathtaking gathering space gazing out to gorgeous treetop views. The split-level floor plan is thoughtfully designed with both festive entertaining and functional family living in mind. Up the left stair, discover a well-appointed gourmet kitchen with abundant glass front cabinetry, new Caesarstone counters and ample casual dining space. Nearby, a light filled guest suite offers a comfortable haven for visiting guests with an updated bath. Three additional bedrooms, one of which is configured as a stately home office, occupy the opposite wing. Easily accessible from the kitchen, the broad redwood deck and flagstone patio develop a scenic vantage point to dine and relax against the backdrop of lush natural views.
Venture just steps down the road to enjoy Parkside Grille and the Thursday Farmer’s Market. The adjacent Town Center offers sports fields, a playground, library and Theatre Conservatory. The village of Woodside, both Robert’s Markets, Ladera Shopping Center, Sand Hill Road, Stanford University and highway 280 are located within minutes. Perfectly located close to Windy Hill Preserve, this turnkey residence is ideal for the avid cyclist, hiker, runner or naturalist, to enjoy an active outdoor lifestyle.
GoPro Trail TV - Los Trancos - Fleet Feet
Justin, Isaac, and Joe from Fleet Feet Sports in Menlo Park hit the trails in Los Trancos Open Space Preserve located above Palo Alto in the South Skyline Region of the Santa Cruz Mountains.
Starting at the top of the hill always makes for a pleasant run, especially when that start point is Los Trancos OSP, perched along the upper meadows of Black Mountain foothills, gazing northward through open fields out to the North Bay and beyond. As we float down the smooth single track of Page Mill Trail dipping in and out of densely wooded creek valleys and cresting along undulating ridges, everything seems so much closer, with the whole peninsula framed right ahead and the clouds almost within grasp. Down we go over bridges and onto fire roads leading to the wide open hilltops of Foothills Park at Trapper's Fire Road, where we pause to take in the expansive views of the foothills, Portola Valley and the entire SF Bay Area from Mt Hamilton to Mt Tamalpais and Mt Diablo.
With the exhilaration of sitting atop the world fully absorbed we take off at full tumble pace, soaring down the wide, washed out road with such eagerness, its as if we're running straight to San Francisco non-stop. Dropping further and further down towards Los Trancos Creek along a progressively narrower path, we find ourselves immersed in a labyrinth of dusty chaparral, then passing through forests of scraggly old trees draped in witch's hair. The overgrowth clears briefly and we gain perspective, looking down into the familiar stomping grounds of Portola Valley and up from whence we came. We fall back into the foliage and the trail winds and folds into itself along steep slopes, presenting rugged terrain as we descend into the creek valley where we discover that what goes down, must come up again.
Here begins the long trek back up to the car, trudging along the gurgling waterway, with sporadic glimpses of houses the only reminder that we're not tucked away in a lush wilderness. A recent landslide from the sandstone cliffs above breaks the cadence of our climb, forcing us to slow up and clamber over the mounds of rubble as we contemplate the sheer force of nature. After a steady sauntering up the hill we eventually emerge again in the hilltop meadows leading back to the Page Mill Trail. Here we follow the gradual grade with muscles fully warmed by our long descent, fully appreciating the silence of our isolation and the cool air and warm sun overhead. While we acknowledge that our temporary escape is coming to an end, it is comforting to know that this vast network of rich trails snaking through the Santa Cruz Mountains is right in our backyard, just a quick skip away.
Alpine Road from Arastradero to Sand Hill Road
One of the nicer, gradual descents is Alpine Road. Even with a little wind, it is quite enjoyable to ride.
San Francisco | Wikipedia audio article
This is an audio version of the Wikipedia Article:
San Francisco
Listening is a more natural way of learning, when compared to reading. Written language only began at around 3200 BC, but spoken language has existed long ago.
Learning by listening is a great way to:
- increases imagination and understanding
- improves your listening skills
- improves your own spoken accent
- learn while on the move
- reduce eye strain
Now learn the vast amount of general knowledge available on Wikipedia through audio (audio article). You could even learn subconsciously by playing the audio while you are sleeping! If you are planning to listen a lot, you could try using a bone conduction headphone, or a standard speaker instead of an earphone.
You can find other Wikipedia audio articles too at:
You can upload your own Wikipedia articles through:
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
- Socrates
SUMMARY
=======
San Francisco (SF; ; Spanish for 'Saint Francis'; Spanish: [ˈsãɱ fɾãnˈsisko]), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California. San Francisco is the 13th most populous city in the United States, and the 4th most populous in California, with 884,363 residents as of 2017. It covers an area of about 46.89 square miles (121.4 km2), mostly at the north end of the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area, making it the second most densely populated large US city, and the fifth most densely populated U.S. county, behind only four of the five New York City boroughs. San Francisco is also part of the fifth most populous primary statistical area in the United States, the San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland, CA Combined Statistical Area (8.8 million residents).
As of 2017, it was the 7th highest-income county in the United States, with a per capita personal income of $119,868. The San Francisco CSA was the country's 3rd largest urban economy as of 2017, with a GDP of $878 billion. Of the 574 primary statistical areas in the US, the San Francisco CSA had the highest GDP per capita in 2017, at $99,347 per capita. San Francisco was ranked 14th in the world and third in the United States on the Global Financial Centres Index as of September 2018.San Francisco was founded on June 29, 1776, when colonists from Spain established Presidio of San Francisco at the Golden Gate and Mission San Francisco de Asís a few miles away, all named for St. Francis of Assisi. The California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856. San Francisco's status as the West Coast's largest city peaked between 1870 and 1900, when around 25% of California's population resided in the city. After three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a major port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. It then became the birthplace of the United Nations in 1945. After the war, the confluence of returning servicemen, significant immigration, liberalizing attitudes, along with the rise of the hippie counterculture, the Sexual Revolution, the Peace Movement growing from opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, and other factors led to the Summer of Love and the gay rights movement, cementing San Francisco as a center of liberal activism in the United States. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines.
A popular tourist destination, San Francisco is known for its cool summers, fog, steep rolling hills, eclectic mix of architecture, and landmarks, including the Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars, the former Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, Fisherman's Wharf, and its Chinatown district. San Francisco is also the headquarters of five major banking institutions and various other companies such as Levi Strauss & Co., Gap Inc., Fitbit, Salesforce.com, Dropbox, Reddit, Square, Inc., Dolby, Airbnb, Weebly, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Yelp, Pinterest, Twitter, Uber, Lyft, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, Craigslist, and Weather Underground. It is home to a number of educational and cultural institutions, such as the University of San Francisco (USF), University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), San Francisco State University (SFSU), the De Young Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the California Academy of Sciences.
As of 2018, San Francisco is the highest rated American city on world liveability rankings.
Chaco Culture National Historical Park | Wikipedia audio article
This is an audio version of the Wikipedia Article:
Chaco Culture National Historical Park
00:01:56 1 Geography
00:03:36 2 Geology
00:05:05 3 Climate
00:06:35 4 Flora and fauna
00:08:32 5 History
00:08:41 5.1 Archaic–Early Basketmakers
00:09:47 5.2 Ancestral Puebloans
00:12:36 5.3 Athabaskan succession
00:13:18 5.4 Excavation and protection
00:18:38 6 Management
00:21:01 7 Sites
00:21:25 7.1 Central canyon
00:25:01 7.2 Outliers
00:28:41 8 Ruins
00:28:50 8.1 Great houses
00:31:02 8.2 Uses
00:33:49 9 Archaeoastronomy
00:33:58 9.1 Sun Dagger
00:36:12 9.2 Alignments
00:39:06 10 Gallery
00:39:15 11 See also
00:39:49 12 Notes
Listening is a more natural way of learning, when compared to reading. Written language only began at around 3200 BC, but spoken language has existed long ago.
Learning by listening is a great way to:
- increases imagination and understanding
- improves your listening skills
- improves your own spoken accent
- learn while on the move
- reduce eye strain
Now learn the vast amount of general knowledge available on Wikipedia through audio (audio article). You could even learn subconsciously by playing the audio while you are sleeping! If you are planning to listen a lot, you could try using a bone conduction headphone, or a standard speaker instead of an earphone.
You can find other Wikipedia audio articles too at:
You can upload your own Wikipedia articles through:
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
- Socrates
SUMMARY
=======
Chaco Culture National Historical Park is a United States National Historical Park hosting the densest and most exceptional concentration of pueblos in the American Southwest. The park is located in northwestern New Mexico, between Albuquerque and Farmington, in a remote canyon cut by the Chaco Wash. Containing the most sweeping collection of ancient ruins north of Mexico, the park preserves one of the most important pre-Columbian cultural and historical areas in the United States.Between AD 900 and 1150, Chaco Canyon was a major center of culture for the Ancient Pueblo Peoples. Chacoans quarried sandstone blocks and hauled timber from great distances, assembling fifteen major complexes that remained the largest buildings in North America until the 19th century. Evidence of archaeoastronomy at Chaco has been proposed, with the Sun Dagger petroglyph at Fajada Butte a popular example. Many Chacoan buildings may have been aligned to capture the solar and lunar cycles, requiring generations of astronomical observations and centuries of skillfully coordinated construction. Climate change is thought to have led to the emigration of Chacoans and the eventual abandonment of the canyon, beginning with a fifty-year drought commencing in 1130.Comprising a UNESCO World Heritage Site located in the arid and sparsely populated Four Corners region, the Chacoan cultural sites are fragile – concerns of erosion caused by tourists have led to the closure of Fajada Butte to the public. The sites are considered sacred ancestral homelands by the Hopi and Pueblo people, who maintain oral accounts of their historical migration from Chaco and their spiritual relationship to the land. Though park preservation efforts can conflict with native religious beliefs, tribal representatives work closely with the National Park Service to share their knowledge and respect the heritage of the Chacoan culture.The park is on the Trails of the Ancients Byway, one of the designated New Mexico Scenic Byways.
San Francisco | Wikipedia audio article
This is an audio version of the Wikipedia Article:
San Francisco
Listening is a more natural way of learning, when compared to reading. Written language only began at around 3200 BC, but spoken language has existed long ago.
Learning by listening is a great way to:
- increases imagination and understanding
- improves your listening skills
- improves your own spoken accent
- learn while on the move
- reduce eye strain
Now learn the vast amount of general knowledge available on Wikipedia through audio (audio article). You could even learn subconsciously by playing the audio while you are sleeping! If you are planning to listen a lot, you could try using a bone conduction headphone, or a standard speaker instead of an earphone.
You can find other Wikipedia audio articles too at:
You can upload your own Wikipedia articles through:
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
- Socrates
SUMMARY
=======
San Francisco (SF; ; Spanish for 'Saint Francis'; Spanish: [ˈsãɱ fɾãnˈsisko]), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California. San Francisco is the 13th most populous city in the United States, and the 4th most populous in California, with 884,363 residents as of 2017. It covers an area of about 46.89 square miles (121.4 km2), mostly at the north end of the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area, making it the second most densely populated large US city, and the fifth most densely populated U.S. county, behind only four of the five New York City boroughs. San Francisco is also part of the fifth most populous primary statistical area in the United States, the San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland, CA Combined Statistical Area (8.8 million residents).
As of 2017, it was the 7th highest-income county in the United States, with a per capita personal income of $119,868. The San Francisco CSA was the country's 3rd largest urban economy as of 2017, with a GDP of $878 billion. Of the 574 primary statistical areas in the US, the San Francisco CSA had the highest GDP per capita in 2017, at $99,347 per capita. San Francisco was ranked 14th in the world and third in the United States on the Global Financial Centres Index as of September 2018.San Francisco was founded on June 29, 1776, when colonists from Spain established Presidio of San Francisco at the Golden Gate and Mission San Francisco de Asís a few miles away, all named for St. Francis of Assisi. The California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856. San Francisco's status as the West Coast's largest city peaked between 1870 and 1900, when around 25% of California's population resided in the city. After three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a major port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. It then became the birthplace of the United Nations in 1945. After the war, the confluence of returning servicemen, significant immigration, liberalizing attitudes, along with the rise of the hippie counterculture, the Sexual Revolution, the Peace Movement growing from opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, and other factors led to the Summer of Love and the gay rights movement, cementing San Francisco as a center of liberal activism in the United States. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines.
A popular tourist destination, San Francisco is known for its cool summers, fog, steep rolling hills, eclectic mix of architecture, and landmarks, including the Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars, the former Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, Fisherman's Wharf, and its Chinatown district. San Francisco is also the headquarters of five major banking institutions and various other companies such as Levi Strauss & Co., Gap Inc., Fitbit, Salesforce.com, Dropbox, Reddit, Square, Inc., Dolby, Airbnb, Weebly, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Yelp, Pinterest, Twitter, Uber, Lyft, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, Craigslist, and Weather Underground. It is home to a number of educational and cultural institutions, such as the University of San Francisco (USF), University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), San Francisco State University (SFSU), the De Young Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the California Academy of Sciences.
As of 2018, San Francisco is the highest rated American city on world liveability rankings.
Coal Creek Preserve - Crazy Peet's Road Downhill
mountain bike downhill - Coal Creek Preserve - Crazy Peet's Road Downhill
San Francisco, California | Wikipedia audio article
This is an audio version of the Wikipedia Article:
San Francisco, California
00:04:16 1 History
00:16:49 2 Geography
00:20:02 2.1 Cityscape
00:20:10 2.1.1 Neighborhoods
00:25:05 2.2 Climate
00:28:52 3 Demographics
00:29:55 3.1 Race, ethnicity, religion, and languages
00:33:24 3.1.1 Ethnic clustering
00:34:40 3.2 Education, households, and income
00:37:17 3.3 Homelessness
00:38:40 4 Economy
00:45:11 4.1 Technology
00:46:55 4.2 Tourism and conventions
00:49:14 5 Culture and contemporary life
00:53:55 5.1 LGBT
00:55:22 5.2 Entertainment and performing arts
00:56:43 5.3 Museums
00:58:09 5.4 Nicknames
00:58:43 6 Sports
01:01:56 7 Beaches and parks
01:04:02 8 Law and government
01:07:29 8.1 Crime
01:08:58 8.2 Gangs
01:10:09 8.3 Public safety
01:10:43 9 Education
01:10:52 9.1 Colleges and universities
01:14:00 9.2 Primary and secondary schools
01:14:51 9.3 Early education
01:15:21 10 Media
01:18:33 11 Transportation
01:18:42 11.1 Freeways and roads
01:20:19 11.2 Public transportation
01:23:11 11.3 Airports
01:24:13 11.4 Cycling and walking
01:26:14 12 International relations
01:26:36 13 See also
Listening is a more natural way of learning, when compared to reading. Written language only began at around 3200 BC, but spoken language has existed long ago.
Learning by listening is a great way to:
- increases imagination and understanding
- improves your listening skills
- improves your own spoken accent
- learn while on the move
- reduce eye strain
Now learn the vast amount of general knowledge available on Wikipedia through audio (audio article). You could even learn subconsciously by playing the audio while you are sleeping! If you are planning to listen a lot, you could try using a bone conduction headphone, or a standard speaker instead of an earphone.
You can find other Wikipedia audio articles too at:
You can upload your own Wikipedia articles through:
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
- Socrates
SUMMARY
=======
San Francisco (SF; ; Spanish for 'Saint Francis'; Spanish: [ˈsãɱ fɾãnˈsisko]), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California. San Francisco is the 13th most populous city in the United States, and the 4th most populous in California, with 884,363 residents as of 2017. It covers an area of about 46.89 square miles (121.4 km2), mostly at the north end of the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area, making it the second most densely populated large US city, and the fifth most densely populated U.S. county, behind only four of the five New York City boroughs. San Francisco is also part of the fifth most populous primary statistical area in the United States, the San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland, CA Combined Statistical Area (8.8 million residents).
As of 2017, it was the 7th highest-income county in the United States, with a per capita personal income of $119,868. The San Francisco CSA was the country's 3rd largest urban economy as of 2017, with a GDP of $878 billion. Of the 574 primary statistical areas in the US, the San Francisco CSA had the highest GDP per capita in 2017, at $99,347 per capita. San Francisco was ranked 14th in the world and third in the United States on the Global Financial Centres Index as of September 2018.San Francisco was founded on June 29, 1776, when colonists from Spain established Presidio of San Francisco at the Golden Gate and Mission San Francisco de Asís a few miles away, all named for St. Francis of Assisi. The California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856. San Francisco's status as the West Coast's largest city peaked between 1870 and 1900, when around 25% of California's population resided in the city. After three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a major port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. It then became the birthplace of the United Nations in 1945. After the war, the confluence of returning servicemen, significant immigration, liberalizing attitudes, along with the rise of the hippie counterculture, the Sexual Revolution, the Peace Movement growing from opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War, and other factors led to the Summer of Love and the gay rights movement, cementing San Francisco as a center of liberal activism in the United States. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines.
A popular tourist destination, San Francisco is known for its cool summers, fog, steep rolling hills, eclectic mix of architecture, and landm ...
3000+ Common English Words with British Pronunciation
3143 most frequent english words with british sound, randomly presented.
Knowing this vocabulary will permit you to understand at least 85% of any written or spoken english text.
American english version:
The list of words is available here: (same order as in the video).
*** NEW ***
2015-12-03 - Translations available as subtitles in 35+ languages!
Enable the captions using the CC button and then choose your language in the settings menu. Do you need a language not listed here? Just leave a comment and I will create it!
► ES
3143 palabras comunes en inglés con su respectiva pronunciación con acento británico, presentadas aleatoriamente. Conocer estos términos permite comprender al menos el 85% de cualquier texto en inglés, ya sea escrito u oral.
► FR
3143 mots le plus fréquents en anglais avec leur prononciation britannique respective, présentés aléatoirement. La connaissance de ces mots vous permettra de comprendre au moins 85% de tout texte en anglais, oral ou écrit.
__________
Have you found this video helpful? Any comment or suggestion is welcome!
Apollo 11 (2019)
From director Todd Douglas Miller (Dinosaur 13) comes a cinematic event 50 years in the making. Crafted from a newly discovered trove of 65mm footage, and more than 11,000 hours of uncatalogued audio recordings, Apollo 11 takes us straight to the heart of NASA's most celebrated mission—the one that first put men on the moon, and forever made Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin into household names. Immersed in the perspectives of the astronauts, the team in Mission Control, and the millions of spectators on the ground, we vividly experience those momentous days and hours in 1969 when humankind took a giant leap into the future.
Jason Bourne
Matt Damon returns to his most iconic role in Jason Bourne. Paul Greengrass, the director of The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum, once again joins Damon for the next chapter of Universal Pictures’ Bourne franchise, which finds the CIA’s most lethal operative drawn out of the shadows. Damon is joined by Alicia Vikander, Vincent Cassel and Tommy Lee Jones, while Julia Stiles reprises her role in the series. (Original Title - Jason Bourne) - 2016 Universal Studios. All Rights Reserved.
3000+ Common English Words with Pronunciation
3134 most frequent english words with sound (american pronunciation), randomly presented.
Knowing this vocabulary will permit you to understand at least 85% of any written or spoken english text.
► TRANSLATIONS AS SUBTITLES
Enable the captions clicking the CC button and then choose a language from the settings menu! If you want a translation for a not available language just ask for it!
► ADDITIONAL MATERIAL
Word list (sorted alphabetically):
Word list (sorted as in the video):
British pronunciation version:
► ES
3134 palabras comunes en inglés con su respectiva pronunciación, presentadas al azar. Conocer estos términos permite comprender al menos el 85% de cualquier texto en inglés, ya sea escrito u oral.
► FR
3134 mots le plus fréquents en anglais avec leur prononciation respective, présentés aléatoirement. La connaissance de ces mots vous permettra de comprendre au moins 85% de tout texte en anglais, oral ou écrit.
__________
Have you found this video helpful? Any comment or suggestion is welcome!
Suspense: Lonely Road / Out of Control / Post Mortem
The program's heyday was in the early 1950s, when radio actor, producer and director Elliott Lewis took over (still during the Wilcox/Autolite run). Here the material reached new levels of sophistication. The writing was taut, and the casting, which had always been a strong point of the series (featuring such film stars as Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, Henry Fonda, Humphrey Bogart, Judy Garland, Ronald Colman, Marlene Dietrich, Eve McVeagh, Lena Horne, and Cary Grant), took an unexpected turn when Lewis expanded the repertory to include many of radio's famous drama and comedy stars — often playing against type — such as Jack Benny. Jim and Marian Jordan of Fibber McGee and Molly were heard in the episode, Backseat Driver, which originally aired February 3, 1949.
The highest production values enhanced Suspense, and many of the shows retain their power to grip and entertain. At the time he took over Suspense, Lewis was familiar to radio fans for playing Frankie Remley, the wastrel guitar-playing sidekick to Phil Harris in The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show. On the May 10, 1951 Suspense, Lewis reversed the roles with Death on My Hands: A bandleader (Harris) is horrified when an autograph-seeking fan accidentally shoots herself and dies in his hotel room, and a vocalist (Faye) tries to help him as the townfolk call for vigilante justice against him.
With the rise of television and the departures of Lewis and Autolite, subsequent producers (Antony Ellis, William N. Robson and others) struggled to maintain the series despite shrinking budgets, the availability of fewer name actors, and listenership decline. To save money, the program frequently used scripts first broadcast by another noteworthy CBS anthology, Escape. In addition to these tales of exotic adventure, Suspense expanded its repertoire to include more science fiction and supernatural content. By the end of its run, the series was remaking scripts from the long-canceled program The Mysterious Traveler. A time travel tale like Robert Arthur's The Man Who Went Back to Save Lincoln or a thriller about a death ray-wielding mad scientist would alternate with more run-of-the-mill crime dramas.
Suspense: Tree of Life / The Will to Power / Overture in Two Keys
Alfred Hitchcock's first thriller was his third silent film The Lodger (1926), a suspenseful Jack the Ripper story. His next thriller was Blackmail (1929), his and Britain's first sound film. Of Hitchcock's fifteen major features made between 1925 and 1935, only six were suspense films, the two mentioned above plus Murder!, Number Seventeen, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and The 39 Steps. From 1935 on, however, most of his output was thrillers.
One of the earliest spy films was Fritz Lang's Spies (1928), the director's first independent production, with an anarchist international conspirator and criminal spy character named Haghi (Rudolf Klein-Rogge), who was pursued by good-guy Agent No. 326 (Willy Fritsch) (aka Det. Donald Tremaine, English version) -- this film anticipated the James Bond films of the future. Another was Greta Garbo's portrayal of the real-life, notorious, seductive German double agent code-named Mata Hari (Gertrud Zelle) in World War I in Mata Hari (1932), who performed a pearl-draped dance to entice French officers to divulge their secrets.
The chilling German film M (1931) directed by Fritz Lang, starred Peter Lorre (in his first film role) as a criminal deviant who preys on children. The film's story was based on the life of serial killer Peter Kurten (known as the 'Vampire of Düsseldorf'). Edward Sutherland's crime thriller Murders in the Zoo (1933) from Paramount starred Lionel Atwill as a murderous and jealous zoologist.
Other British directors, such as Walter Forde, Victor Saville, George A. Cooper, and even the young Michael Powell made more thrillers in the same period; Forde made nine, Vorhaus seven between 1932 and 1935, Cooper six in the same period, and Powell the same. Hitchcock was following a strong British trend in his choice of genre.
Notable examples of Hitchcock's early British suspense-thriller films include The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), his first spy-chase/romantic thriller, The 39 Steps (1935) with Robert Donat handcuffed to Madeleine Carroll and The Lady Vanishes (1938).
Calling All Cars: Crime v. Time / One Good Turn Deserves Another / Hang Me Please
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California.
The LAPD has been copiously fictionalized in numerous movies, novels and television shows throughout its history. The department has also been associated with a number of controversies, mainly concerned with racial animosity, police brutality and police corruption.
The radio show Calling All Cars hired LAPD radio dispacher Jesse Rosenquist to be the voice of the dispatcher. Rosenquist was already famous because home radios could tune into early police radio frequencies. As the first police radio dispatcher presented to the public ear, his was the voice that actors went to when called upon for a radio dispatcher role.
The iconic television series Dragnet, with LAPD Detective Joe Friday as the primary character, was the first major media representation of the department. Real LAPD operations inspired Jack Webb to create the series and close cooperation with department officers let him make it as realistic as possible, including authentic police equipment and sound recording on-site at the police station.
Due to Dragnet's popularity, LAPD Chief Parker became, after J. Edgar Hoover, the most well known and respected law enforcement official in the nation. In the 1960s, when the LAPD under Chief Thomas Reddin expanded its community relations division and began efforts to reach out to the African-American community, Dragnet followed suit with more emphasis on internal affairs and community policing than solving crimes, the show's previous mainstay.
Several prominent representations of the LAPD and its officers in television and film include Adam-12, Blue Streak, Blue Thunder, Boomtown, The Closer, Colors, Crash, Columbo, Dark Blue, Die Hard, End of Watch, Heat, Hollywood Homicide, Hunter, Internal Affairs, Jackie Brown, L.A. Confidential, Lakeview Terrace, Law & Order: Los Angeles, Life, Numb3rs, The Shield, Southland, Speed, Street Kings, SWAT, Training Day and the Lethal Weapon, Rush Hour and Terminator film series. The LAPD is also featured in the video games Midnight Club II, Midnight Club: Los Angeles, L.A. Noire and Call of Juarez: The Cartel.
The LAPD has also been the subject of numerous novels. Elizabeth Linington used the department as her backdrop in three different series written under three different names, perhaps the most popular being those novel featuring Det. Lt. Luis Mendoza, who was introduced in the Edgar-nominated Case Pending. Joseph Wambaugh, the son of a Pittsburgh policeman, spent fourteen years in the department, using his background to write novels with authentic fictional depictions of life in the LAPD. Wambaugh also created the Emmy-winning TV anthology series Police Story. Wambaugh was also a major influence on James Ellroy, who wrote several novels about the Department set during the 1940s and 1950s, the most famous of which are probably The Black Dahlia, fictionalizing the LAPD's most famous cold case, and L.A. Confidential, which was made into a film of the same name. Both the novel and the film chronicled mass-murder and corruption inside and outside the force during the Parker era. Critic Roger Ebert indicates that the film's characters (from the 1950s) represent the choices ahead for the LAPD: assisting Hollywood limelight, aggressive policing with relaxed ethics, and a straight arrow approach.
The Long Way Home / Heaven Is in the Sky / I Have Three Heads / Epitaph's Spoon River Anthology
Spoon River Anthology (1915), by Edgar Lee Masters, is a collection of short free-form poems that collectively describe the life of the fictional small town of Spoon River, named after the real Spoon River that ran near Masters' home town. The collection includes two hundred and twelve separate characters, all providing two-hundred forty-four accounts of their lives and losses. The poems were originally published in the magazine Reedy's Mirror.
Each following poem is an epitaph of a dead citizen, delivered by the dead themselves. They speak about the sorts of things one might expect: some recite their histories and turning points, others make observations of life from the outside, and petty ones complain of the treatment of their graves, while few tell how they really died. Speaking without reason to lie or fear the consequences, they construct a picture of life in their town that is shorn of façades. The interplay of various villagers — e.g. a bright and successful man crediting his parents for all he's accomplished, and an old woman weeping because he is secretly her illegitimate child — forms a gripping, if not pretty, whole.
The subject of afterlife receives only the occasional brief mention, and even those seem to be contradictory.
The work features such characters as Tom Merritt, Amos Sibley, Carl Hamblin, Fiddler Jones and A.D. Blood. Many of the characters that make appearances in Spoon River Anthology were based on real people that Masters knew or heard of in the two towns in which he grew up, Petersburg and Lewistown, Illinois. Most notable is Ann Rutledge, regarded in local legend to be Abraham Lincoln's early love interest though there is no actual proof of such a relationship. Rutledge's grave can still be found in a Petersburg cemetery, and a tour of graveyards in both towns reveals most of the surnames that Masters applied to his characters.
Other local legends assert that Masters' fictional portrayal of local residents, often in unflattering light, created a lot of embarrassment and aggravation in his hometown. This is offered as an explanation for why he chose not to settle down in Lewistown or Petersburg.
Spoon River Anthology is often used in second year characterization work in the Meisner technique of actor training.