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A Town Like Alice
''A Town Like Alice'' (United States title: ''The Legacy'') is a romance novel by Nevil Shute, published in 1950 when Shute had newly settled in Australia. Jean Paget, a young Englishwoman, becomes romantically interested in a fellow prisoner of World War II in British Malaya, Malaya, and after liberation emigrates to Australia to be with him, where she attempts, by investing her substantial financial inheritance, to generate economic prosperity in a small outback community—to turn it into "a town like Alice" i.e. Alice Springs. Plot summary The story falls broadly into three parts. In post-World War II London, Jean Paget, a secretary in a leather goods factory, is informed by solicitor Noel Strachan that she has inherited a considerable sum of money from an uncle she never knew. But the solicitor is now her trustee and she only has the use of the income until she inherits absolutely, at the age of thirty-five, several years in the future. In the firm's interest, but incre ...
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A Town Like Alice (1956 Film)
''A Town Like Alice'' is a 1956 British drama film produced by Joseph Janni and starring Virginia McKenna and Peter Finch that is based on the 1950 novel of the same name by Nevil Shute. The film does not follow the whole novel, concluding at the end of part two and truncating or omitting much detail. It was partially filmed in Malaya and Australia. Plot In post-Second World War London, a young woman, Jean Paget, is informed by solicitor Noel Strachan that she has a large inheritance. Jean uses part of it to build a well in a small village in Malaya. The village women will no longer have to walk so far each day to collect water. She lived and worked there for three years during the war. The film then goes in flashback to 1942. Jean is working in an office in Kuala Lumpur in Malaya when the Japanese invade. When she stays to help the wife of her employer, Mr. Holland, with her three children, she is taken prisoner, along with other white men, women and children. The men a ...
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Nevil Shute
Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 189912 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect his engineering career from inferences by his employers (Vickers) or from fellow engineers that he was '"not a serious person" or from potentially adverse publicity in connection with his novels, which included '' On the Beach'' and '' A Town Like Alice''. Early life Shute was born in Somerset Road, Ealing (which was then in Middlesex), in the house described in his novel ''Trustee from the Toolroom''. He was educated at the Dragon School, Shrewsbury School and Balliol College, Oxford; he graduated from Oxford in 1922 with a third-class degree in engineering science. Shute's father, Arthur Hamilton Norway, became head of the Post Office in Ireland before the First World War and was based at the General Post Office, Dublin in 1916 at th ...
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Dutch East Indies
The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which came under the administration of the Dutch government in 1800. During the 19th century, the Dutch possessions and hegemony expanded, reaching the greatest territorial extent in the early 20th century. The Dutch East Indies was one of the most valuable colonies under European rule, and contributed to Dutch global prominence in spice and cash crop trade in the 19th to early 20th centuries. The colonial social order was based on rigid racial and social structures with a Dutch elite living separate from but linked to their native subjects. The term ''Indonesia'' came into use for the geographical location after 1880. In the early 20th century, local intellectuals began developing the concept of Indonesia as a nation state, and set the st ...
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Peter Finch
Frederick George Peter Ingle Finch (28 September 191614 January 1977) was an English-Australian actor of theatre, film and radio. Born in London, he emigrated to Australia as a teenager and was raised in Sydney, where he worked in vaudeville and radio before becoming a star of Australian films. Joining the Old Vic Company after World War II, he achieved widespread critical success in Britain for both stage and screen performances. One of British cinema's most celebrated leading men of the time, Finch won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role five times, and won a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of crazed television anchorman Howard Beale in the 1976 film ''Network''. According to the British Film Institute, "it is arguable that no other actor ever chalked up such a rewarding CV in British films, and he accumulated the awards to bolster this view.." He died only two months before the 49th Academy Awards, making him the first person to w ...
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Virginia McKenna
Dame Virginia Anne McKenna, (born 7 June 1931) is a British stage and screen actress, author and wildlife campaigner. She is best known for the films ''A Town Like Alice'' (1956), '' Carve Her Name with Pride'' (1958), ''Born Free'' (1966), and ''Ring of Bright Water'' (1969), as well as her work with The Born Free Foundation. Early life McKenna was born in Marylebone to a theatrical family and was educated at Heron's Ghyll School, a former independent boarding school near the market town of Horsham in Sussex. She spent six years in South Africa before returning to the school at the age of fourteen, after which she attended the Central School of Speech and Drama, at that time based at the Royal Albert Hall, London. Career Aged 19, McKenna spent six months at Dundee Repertory Theatre. She worked on stage in London's West End theatre, making her debut in ''Penny for a Song''. She attracted attention on TV appearing in ''Winter's Tale'' with John Gielgud and ''Shout Aloud Salv ...
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1956 In Film
Events January * January 1 – The Anglo-Egyptian Condominium ends in Sudan. * January 8 – Operation Auca: Five U.S. evangelical Christian missionaries, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, Ed McCully, Jim Elliot and Pete Fleming, are killed for trespassing by the Huaorani people of Ecuador, shortly after making contact with them. * January 16 – Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser vows to reconquer Palestine. * January 25– 26 – Finnish troops reoccupy Porkkala, after Soviet troops vacate its military base. Civilians can return February 4. * January 26 – The 1956 Winter Olympics open in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy. February * February 11 – British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean resurface in the Soviet Union, after being missing for 5 years. * February 14– 25 – The 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is held in Moscow. * February 16 – The 1956 World Figure Skating Championships open in Garmisch, West Germany. * February 22 – ...
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Motion Picture
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere through the use of moving images. These images are generally accompanied by sound and, more rarely, other sensory stimulations. The word "cinema", short for cinematography, is often used to refer to filmmaking and the film industry, and to the art form that is the result of it. Recording and transmission of film The moving images of a film are created by photographing actual scenes with a motion-picture camera, by photographing drawings or miniature models using traditional animation techniques, by means of CGI and computer animation, or by a combination of some or all of these techniques, and other visual effects. Before the introduction of digital production, series of still images were recorded on a strip of chemically sensitize ...
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Burke And Wills Expedition
The Burke and Wills expedition was organised by the Royal Society of Victoria in Australia in 1860–61. It consisted of 19 men led by Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills, with the objective of crossing Australia from Melbourne in the south, to the Gulf of Carpentaria in the north, a distance of around 3,250 kilometres (approximately 2,000 miles). At that time most of the inland of Australia had not been explored by non-Indigenous people and was largely unknown to the European settlers. The expedition left Melbourne in winter. Very bad weather, poor roads and broken-down horse wagons meant they made slow progress at first. After dividing the party at Menindee on the Darling River Burke made good progress, reaching Cooper Creek at the beginning of summer. The expedition established a depot camp at the Cooper, and Burke, Wills and two other men pushed on to the north coast (although swampland stopped them from reaching the northern coastline). The return journey was plag ...
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Normanton, Queensland
Normanton is an outback town and coastal locality in the Shire of Carpentaria, Queensland, Australia. In the the locality of Normanton had a population of 1,257 people, of whom 750 (60%) identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people, while the town of Normanton had a population of 1,210 people, of whom 743 (62%) identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people. It is the administrative centre of the Shire of Carpentaria. It has a tropical savanna climate and the main economy of the locality is cattle grazing. The town is one terminus of the isolated Normanton to Croydon railway line, which was built during gold rush days in the 1890s. The Gulflander passenger train operates once a week. The "Big Barramundi" and a statue of a large saltwater crocodile are notable attractions of the town, along with many heritage-listed sites. History The town sits in the traditional lands of the Gkuthaarn (Kareldi) and Kukatj people. The town takes its name ...
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Burketown, Queensland
Burketown is an isolated outback town and coastal locality in the Shire of Burke, Queensland, Australia. In the , the locality of Burketown had a population of 238 people. It is located west of Cairns and west of Normanton on the Albert River and Savannah Way in the area known as the Gulf Savannah. Geography Burketown is located on the Albert River to the north west of the state capital, Brisbane, with the nearest larger town being Normanton, to the east, and the nearest city being Mount Isa, to the south. The town is roughly inland from the Gulf of Carpentaria. It is located west of Cairns via the Savannah Way passing through the area known as the Gulf Savannah. The town is the administrative centre of the Burke Shire Council. History Aboriginal History Aboriginal Australian peoples had inhabited the region for millennia before European explorers travelled the area. The Yukulta / Ganggalidda and Garawa peoples are recognised as the traditional owners of the ...
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Last Meal
A condemned prisoner's last meal is a customary ritual preceding execution. In many countries, the prisoner may, within reason, select what the last meal will be. Contemporary restrictions in the United States In the United States, most states give the meal a day or two before execution and use the euphemism "special meal". Alcohol or tobacco are usually, but not always, denied. Unorthodox or unavailable requests are replaced with similar substitutes. Some states place tight restrictions. In Florida, the food for the last meal must be purchased locally and the cost is limited to $40. In Oklahoma, the cost is limited to $25. In Louisiana, the prison warden traditionally joins the condemned prisoner for the last meal. On one occasion, the warden paid for an inmate's lobster dinner. Sometimes, a prisoner asks to share the last meal with another inmate (as Francis Crowley did with John Resko) or has the meal distributed among other inmates (as requested by Raymond Fernandez). In ...
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Crucified
Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the victim is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross or beam and left to hang until eventual death from exhaustion and asphyxiation. It was used as a punishment by the Persians, Carthaginians and Romans, among others. Crucifixion has been used in parts of the world as recently as the twentieth century. The crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth is central to Christianity, and the cross (sometimes depicting Jesus nailed to it) is the main religious symbol for many Christian churches. Terminology Ancient Greek has two verbs for crucify: (), from (which in today's Greek only means "cross" but which in antiquity was used of any kind of wooden pole, pointed or blunt, bare or with attachments) and () "crucify on a plank", together with ( "impale"). In earlier pre-Roman Greek texts usually means "impale". The Greek used in the Christian New Testament uses four verbs, three of them based upon (), usually translated "cross". Th ...
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