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Guy Lafleur is a former professional ice hockey player that is widely regarded as one of the most naturally gifted and popular players ever to play the game. Between 1971 and 1991, he played for the Montreal Canadiens, New York Rangers, and Quebec Nordiques in an NHL career spanning 17 seasons and five Stanley Cup championships.

In his teens, Lafleur gained significant recognition for his play where he led his team to the Memorial Cup in 1971, scoring an amazing 130 regular-season goals. At first, he struggled to live up to expectations in the NHL but by 1974, he had developed his trademark smooth skating style and scoring touch. Lafleur was a cornerstone of five Stanley Cup championship teams and was one of the most popular players on a very popular team. At the conclusion of the 1979 season, several key players retired and the Canadiens’ dynasty came to an end. Injuries shortened Lafleur’s 1980-81 season and his production dropped significantly.

In the following seasons, he was overshadowed by Mike Bossy and Wayne Gretzky. During the 1984-85 season, he decided to retire after scoring only two goals in 19 games. After being inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, Lafleur returned briefly to the NHL from 1988-89 through 1990-91 with the New York Rangers and the Quebec Nordiques. He turned down a one million dollar offer from the Los Angeles Kings to end his career where it had started.

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The Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, more commonly known as San Siro, is a football stadium in Milan, Italy. It is the home stadium for two of the three most successful Italian Football League clubs: A.C. Milan and F.C. Internazionale. It is officially named in honor of Giuseppe Meazza, the Inter and Milan player of the 1930s and 1940s.

With the spectators being so close to the pitch, the stands being so steep, and with a large roof, it is considered to have one of the best atmospheres of any stadium in the world. Construction began in 1925 in the Milanese district of San Siro with the idea to build it in the same district of the horse racing track originating with then-president of A.C. Milan, Piero Pirelli. The architects designed the stadium only for football.

The San Siro’s inauguration was on September 19, 1926 when 35,000 spectators saw Inter defeat Milan 6-3. Originally, the ground was home and property of A.C. Milan but in 1947 Internazionale became tenants and the two have shared the ground ever since. The Italian national side also plays occasional games there and it has also been used for the 1964/65, 1969/70, and 2000/01 Champions League/European Cup finals. The stadium underwent further renovations for the World Cup with $60 million being spent.

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The New York Times is a daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed internationally. It is the largest metropolitan newspaper in the United States and is regarded as a national newspaper of record. The newspaper has won 98 Pulitzer Prizes, more than any other. Its motto, as printed in the upper left-hand corner of the front page, is “All the news that’s fit to print.”

The New York Times was founded on September 18, 1851 by journalist and politician Henry Jarvis Raymond and former banker George Jones as the New-York Daily Times. The paper changed its name to The New York Times in 1857. It was originally published every day but Sunday, but during the Civil War it, along with other major dailies, started publishing Sunday issues. The paper’s influence grew when it published a series of exposes of Boss Tweed that led to the end of the Tweed Ring’s domination of New York’s city hall.

Adolph Ochs coined the paper’s slogan in 1897 as a jab at competing papers such as the New York World and the New York Journal American which were known for lurid yellow journalism. Under his guidance, The New York Times achieved international scope, circulation, and reputation. In the 1940s, the paper extended its breadth and reach. The crossword began appearing regularly in 1942 and the fashion section in 1946. That same year, it began an international edition.

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The Constitution of the United States of America is the supreme law of the U.S. and provides the framework for the organization of their government. The document defines the three main branches of the government: legislative, executive and judicial.

The Constitution carefully outlines which powers each branch may exercise. It also reserves numerous rights for the individual states, thereby establishing the United States’ federal system of government. The Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787 by the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and later ratified by conventions in each state in the name of “The People.” It has since been amended 27 times and the first ten amendments are known as the Bill of Rights. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union was actually the first constitution of the USA and was replaced by the U.S. Constitution.

When the Constitution was completed in Philadelphia, it was followed by a speech given by Benjamin Franklin who urged unanimity. Although, they decided that they only needed nine states to ratify the Constitution for it to go into effect. The Convention submitted it to the Congress of the Confederation where it received approval. Once it was ratified, the government under the Constitution began operations on March 4, 1789.

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The first version of softball was invented in Chicago, Illinois by George Hancock as a winter version of baseball. It was intended to be a way for baseball players to keep in practice during the winter and was initially called “Indoor Baseball.”

Yale and Harvard alumni gathered at the Farragut Boat Club in Chicago to hear the annual football game. When the score was announced and bets were paid, a Yale alum threw a boxing glove at a Harvard supporter. The other person grabbed a stick and swung at it. Hancock called “Play ball!” and the game began. He took a boxing glove and tied it into a ball while a broom handle was used as a bat. The first softball game ended with a score of 44-40. The ball, being soft, was fielded barehanded rather than with gloves. The next week, Hancock developed a ball and an undersized bat.

The Farragut Club soon set rules for the game and they quickly spread to outsiders. The game, under the name of “Indoor-Outdoor,” was moved outside next year and the first rules were published in 1889. The first softball league outside of the United States was organized in Toronto in 1897. The name “softball” dates from 1926 and was coined by Walter Hankanson of the YMCA at a meeting of the National Recreation Congress. The name softball had spread across the U.S. by 1930.

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American Beauty is a 1999 drama film set in modern American suburbia. It stars Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening. It was also the feature film debut of writer Alan Ball and director Sam Mendes. The film was a massive success both critically and commercially with Ball, Bening, Mendes and Spacey all receiving Academy Award nominations in addition to four others, including Best Picture.

The film is narrated by Lester Burnham (Spacey) as he looks back on his life with his deeply dysfunctional family: his wife Carolyn (Bening) and 16-year-old daughter Jane (Thora Birch). Alan Ball wrote American Beauty originally for the stage. He saw a paper bag floating in the wind near the World Trade Center plaza and was inspired by it to write the film. Sam Mendes designed the two girls’ appearance to change over the course of the film, with Thora Birch gradually using less make-up and Mena Suvari gradually using more, to emphasize their shifting perceptions of themselves.

Early reviews uniformly praised the cast, script, and cinematography, as well as the first-time direction by Mendes. The San Francisco Chronicle called it, “a dazzling tale of loneliness, desire and the hollowness of conformity.” On September 11, 1999, American Beauty was shown at the Toronto International Film Festival where it won the People’s Choice award. The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won five.

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Amy Winehouse is an English singer-songwriter, known for her eclectic mix of various musical genres including soul, jazz, rock and roll, and R&B. She is best known for her soulful, powerful contralto vocals. Winehouse’s 2003 debut album Frank did well commercially and critically in her native Britain.

Her 2006 follow-up album Back in Black was inspired by Winehouse’s love of girl groups of the 1950s and 1960s. Working with musician and producer Mark Ronson, the album spawned a number of singles including, most famously “Rehab,” which went to number one on the UK Album Charts numerous times and was named one of the 10 Best Songs of 2007 by Time magazine. It also led to six Grammy Award nominations and five wins, tying the record for the most wins by a female artist in a single night, and made her the first British singer to win five Grammys, including three of the “Big Four”: Best New Artist, Record of the Year, and Song of the Year.

Winehouse has received media attention for her distinctive style, most notably her signature beehive hairstyle, and has been the muse to fashion designers like Karl Lagerfeld. The singer’s problems with drugs and alcohol addiction, as well as self-destructive behavior, have become regular tabloid news since 2007. She and her husband have been plagued by legal troubles that has led to the cancellation of several tour dates.

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Don Bluth is an American animator and independent studio owner. He became one of the chief animators at the Walt Disney Company. Along with fellow animators Gary Goldman and John Pomeroy, he set out in 1979 to start his own animation studio.

While working at Disney, he was an assistant animator on 101 Dalmatians and The Sword in the Stone. He drew a few scenes for The Fox and the Hound but left early in the production. Upset with how the Disney animated features had “lost their charm,” he brought several other of the company’s animators with him to form a rival studio. Bluth’s first feature-length animated film was The Secret of NIMH. It grossed twice its budget at the box office and is considered by many to be his masterpiece.

Teaming up with Rick Dyer in the early 1980s, Bluth then created the groundbreaking arcade game Dragon’s Lair, which let the player control a cartoon-animated character on screen played off a laser disc. This was followed by Space Ace, a science fiction game based on the same technology. Bluth teamed up with Steven Spielberg to make An American Tail and The Land Before Time, both of which did well in theaters. By the end of the ‘80s and into the 1990s, he made films like Rock-a-Doodle and Thumbelina, which were not commercially successful. In 1997, he made Anastasia at Fox Animation Studios and it was a big commercial success.

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Bonanza is an American television series that ran on NBC from September 12, 1959 to January 16, 1973. Lasting 14 seasons, it is among the longest running Western TV series and continues to air sporadically on stations across the country.

Bonanza got its name from the Comstock Lode which was a very large deposit of silver. Virginia City was founded directly over the lode and was mined fro 19 years. The pilot was written by David Dortort, who also produced the series. For most of its 430 episode run, the main sponsor of Bonanza was Chevrolet and the stars occasionally appeared in commercials endorsing the company’s automobiles. Bonanza was one of the first series to be filmed and broadcast in color. RCA owned NBC (and the series) and wanted to use it to spur sales of color receivers.

The Saturday night ratings were dismal and Bonanza was soon targeted for cancellation. The show was moved to Sunday nights and the ratings soared, and it eventually reached number one by the mid-1960s. It established itself as the single biggest hit TV series of that decade. After being cancelled, the show has been very popular in syndication on cable networks like TV Land, ION, and the Hallmark Channel.

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The Milwaukee Mile is a race track in West Allis, Wisconsin. It is a one-mile long oval track that seats about 50,000 spectators. It operated as a dirt track until 1953 when it was paved. The Milwaukee Mile’s premier distinction is as the oldest operating motor speedway in the world, hosting at least one auto race every year since 1903.

The track is located at the grounds for the Wisconsin State Fair. The track has held events sanctioned by major organizations such as American Automobile Association, NASCAR, and the IndyCar Series. The track started out as a one-mile private horse racing track on or before 1876. The first event was held on September 11, 1903, William Jones of Chicago won a five lap speed contest, and set the first track record with a 72 second, 50 mph lap. There were 24-hour endurance races in 1907 and 1908.

Louis Disbrow won the first 100-mile event in 1915, averaging 62.5 mph. Barney Oldfield’s success at the Mile helped make him a legend when he set the track record in 1905 and raised his speed in 1910 to 70.1 mph in his “Blitzen Benz.” In 1911, Ralph De Palma won the first Milwaukee Mile Championship Car race a week before his Indianapolis 500 win. The tradition of hosting the “race after the Indianapolis 500” began in 1947.

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