Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures. A colonel is typically in charge of a regiment in an army.

"Colonel" is usually the highest or second-highest field rank, and is below the general ranks.

History and origins

As the office of colonel became an established practice, the colonel became the senior captain in a group of companies which were all sworn to observe his personal authority — to be ruled or regimented by him. This regiment, or governance, was to some extent embodied in a contract and set of written rules, also referred to as the colonel's regiment or standing regulation(s). By extension, the group of companies subject to a colonel's regiment (in the foregoing sense) came to be referred to as his regiment (in the modern sense) as well.

With the shift from primarily mercenary to primarily national armies in the course of the seventeenth century, a colonel (normally a member of the aristocracy) became a holder (German ''Inhaber'') or proprietor of a military contract with a sovereign. The colonel purchased the regimental contract — the right to hold the regiment — from the previous holder of that right or directly from the sovereign when a new regiment was formed or an incumbent was killed.

In French usage of this period the senior colonel in the army or in a field force — the senior military contractor — was the colonel general and, in the absence of the sovereign or his designate, the colonel general might serve as the commander of a force. The position, however, was primarily contractual and it became progressively more of a functionless sinecure. (The head of a single regiment or demi brigade would be called a ''mestre de camp'' or, after the Revolution, a ''chef de brigade''.)

By the late 19th century, colonel was a professional military rank though still held typically by an officer in command of a regiment or equivalent unit. Along with other ranks it has become progressively more a matter of ranked duties, qualifications and experience and of corresponding titles and pay scale than of functional office in a particular organization.

As European military influence has expanded throughout the world, the rank of colonel became adopted by nearly every nation in existence under a variety of names.

With the rise of communism, some of the large Communist militaries saw fit to expand the Colonel rank into several grades, resulting in the unique senior colonel rank which was found and is still used in such nations as China and North Korea.

In modern English, the word colonel is pronounced similarly to ''kernel'' (of grain) as a result of entering the language from Middle French in two competing forms, dissimilated ''coronel'' and ''colonel''. The more conservative spelling ''colonel'' was favored in written use and eventually became the standard spelling even as it lost out in pronunciation to ''coronel''.

Colonel-in-Chief

In many modern armies the 'regiment' has more importance as a ceremonial unit or a focus of common loyalty amongst its members, rather than as an actual battle formation. Troops tend to be deployed in 'Battalions' (commanded by a lieutenant colonel) as a more convenient size of military unit, and as such colonels have tended to have a higher profile in specialist and command roles rather than as actual commanders of regiments. However, in Commonwealth armies the position of the colonel as the figurehead of a Regiment is maintained in the honorary role of colonel-in-chief, usually held by members of the Royal Family, the nobility, or retired senior military officers. The Colonel-in-Chief wears a Colonel's uniform and encourages the members of the regiment, but takes no active part in the actual command structure or in any operational duties.

Colonel and equivalent ranks by country

Colonel in individual military forces

The following articles deal with the rank of colonel as it is used in various national militaries.

''Kolonel'' (Belgium, Estonia & Netherlands)

Colonel (Canada)

Colonel (India)

Colonel (Pakistan)

Colonel (United Kingdom)

Colonel (United States)

Central and Eastern European equivalent ranks

Since the 16th century, the rank of regimental commander was adopted by several Central and Eastern European armies, most notably the forces of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Cossacks and then Muscovy. In countries with slavic languages, the exact name of the rank maintains a variety of spellings, all descendant from the Old Slavonic word ''plk'' or ''polk'' meaning ''unit of standing army'' (see The Tale of Igor's Campaign), and include the following:

''Plukovník'' (Czech Republic and Slovakia)

''Pułkownik'' (Poland)

''Pulkininkas'' (Lithuania)

''Polkovnik'' (Russia, Slovenia, Bulgaria)

''Polkovnyk'' (Ukraine)

''Pukovnik'' (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia)

The Hungarian equivalent ''ezredes'' literally means "leader of a thousand" (i.e. of a regiment)

Western European equivalent ranks

''Oberst'' (Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway)

''Överste'' (Sweden)

''Ofursti'' (Iceland)

''Eversti/Överste'' (Finland)

Other national equivalent ranks

Dagarwal (دګروال) Kolonel — Gndapet (գնդապետ) Polkovniki (პოლკოვნიკი)

Shang Xiao Syntagmatarchis (Συνταγματάρχης) Sarhang (سرهنگ) Aluf Mishne (אלוף משנה)

Sangchwa Taeryong

(Taiwan) Shang Hsiao

Nai Phan (TH: นายพัน) Chief of 1,000

* ''Phan Ek'' (TH: พันเอก) First of 1,000: Colonel

* ''Phan Tho'' (TH: พันโท) Second of 1,000: Lieutenant Colonel

Albay Đại tá عقيد Aqid (Egypt and most Arab League member countries)

Gallery

Unless stated otherwise, the insignia shown are those of army colonels.

Colonel as highest ranking officer

Some military forces have a colonel as their highest ranking officer, with no 'general' ranks, and no superior authority (except, perhaps, the head of state as a titular commander-in-chief) other than the respective national government. Examples include the following (arranged alphabetically by country name):

Antigua and Barbuda (170 personnel)

Benin (4,500 personnel)

Costa Rica (about 8,000 personnel)

Gambia (1,900 personnel)

Iceland (100 personnel, employed only for peacekeeping duties)

Libya ( Commands all the Armed Forces - Muammer Gaddafi)

Luxembourg (has only one branch, the army, with a total of 1,500 personnel)

Monaco (two branches, with a total of about 250 personnel)

Niger (8,000 personnel)

Suriname (1,800 personnel)

Vatican City State (135 personnel - the Swiss Guard)

Rank insignia for a COLONEL in several nations which have no higher military rank.
	! Colonel CCP !! Colonel CSP

Other uses of Colonel ranks

See also

List of comparative military ranks

References

Bibliography

Keegan, John; & Wheatcroft, Andrew (1996). ''Who's Who in Military History: From 1453 to the Present Day.'' London: Routledge.

Cecil Adams of the Straight Dope on the pronunciation of "colonel": http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_250.html

Notes

Category:Military ranks Category:Police ranks

ar:عقيد (رتبة عسكرية) az:Polkovnik bs:Pukovnik bg:Полковник ca:Coronel cs:Plukovník da:Oberst de:Oberst et:Kolonel el:Συνταγματάρχης es:Coronel eo:Kolonelo fa:سرهنگ fr:Colonel hr:Pukovnik io:Kolonelo id:Kolonel it:Colonnello he:קולונל jv:Kolonèl ku:Serheng lv:Pulkvedis lt:Pulkininkas ms:Kolonel nl:Kolonel ja:大佐 no:Oberst nn:Oberst nds:Oberst pl:Pułkownik ru:Полковник pt:Coronel ro:Colonel ru:Полковник simple:Colonel sk:Plukovník sl:Polkovnik sr:Пуковник sh:Pukovnik fi:Eversti sv:Överste tr:Albay uk:Полковник ur:کرنل vi:Đại tá zh:上校

colour	grey
name	Hathi
species	Asian elephant
gender	Male
creator	Rudyard Kipling }}

Hathi is a fictional animal character created by Rudyard Kipling for the Mowgli stories collected in ''The Jungle Book'' (1894) and ''The Second Jungle Book'' (1895). Hathi is a bull elephant that lives in the jungle. Kipling named him after ''hāthī'' (हाथी), the Hindi word for "elephant".

Kipling's character

Hathi is head of the elephant troop. He is one of the oldest animals of the jungle and represents order, dignity and obedience to the Law of the Jungle. In "How Fear Came", he tells the jungle animals' creation myth and describes Tha, the Creator.

In the story "Letting In the Jungle", Mowgli reveals that Hathi once destroyed a human village in revenge for being captured, and persuades Hathi and his sons to do the same to Buldeo's village as punishment for threatening Messua with execution.

Disney's character

Disney film

In the Disney film, the character of Hathi, like the other characters in Kipling's Mowgli stories, is greatly transformed and becomes a comic character. He is called "Colonel Hathi", and he leads his wife, Winifred Hathi (voiced by Verna Felton), and his son, Hathi Junior (voiced by Clint Howard), in a marching patrol while singing a deliberately silly song authored by the Sherman Brothers entitled, "Colonel Hathi's March".

The night after Mowgli is hypnotized by Kaa, Col. Hathi and the Dawn Patrol patrol the jungle and wake Mowgli and Bagheera. When Mowgli comes to investigate, he tries to join with help from Junior. After the patrol, Hathi inspects all of his elephants. Once he reaches Mowgli, he thinks of him as a new recruit. But after Mowgli talks back to him, he realizes that Mowgli is a human and yells at him for infiltrating the Dawn Patrol. However, Bagheera comes to stop the fiasco. After Bagheera promises to return Mowgli, Hathi says the famous saying "an elephant NEVER forgets". But as they march along, Winifred tells Hathi that he left Junior behind. When he goes to fetch him, he forgets to say "halt" and all the elephants crash into him.

Later in the film, Bagheera finds Hathi and asks him to find Mowgli, for he has run away. Hathi refuses saying that the herd was on a cross country march and that Shere Khan cannot be found for miles (the irony is that Shere Khan is actually listening to the conversation for he too is looking for Mowgli). Hathi's wife, Winifred, gets furious with Hathi and tells him to find the Man Cub with the threat of taking over command. Hathi does not listen. When Junior tries to convince his dad to find Mowgli, Hathi agrees to find him, bluffing that he "had a plan in mind all the time." (to which Winifred sarcastically replied "Sure, you did!") After he organized all of his elephants, they start the search. Shere Khan then decides to start looking for the man cub.

Other media

Aside from the fact that Hathi does not appear in the Disney Channel show ''Talespin'', Hathi is also one of the main characters in the spin-off ''Jungle Cubs''. This was before he was a colonel and is portrayed as a baby like everyone else. Colonel Hathi returns in the Disney sequel ''The Jungle Book 2'' in which Jim Cummings provided his voice.

At Disneyland Paris

Disneyland Paris originally featured a restaurant named Explorers Club, themed to famous explorers. This is a colonial house in the jungle, decorated with many artifacts from all over the world. In 1995, the restaurant was renamed Colonel Hathi's Pizza Outpost with new meals specialising in a wide range of pizza and pasta dishes.

Hindi

In the language of Hindi, Hathi translates to Elephant. The Elephant (Hathi) has a son that is friends with Mowgli.

Hathi in popular culture

Like all of the main Jungle Book Characters, Hathi is used as a name for a warranted adult, or young leader in many Cub Scout Packs.

Hathi is a major character in the anime series ''Jungle Book Shonen Mowgli'' where he is the king and enforcer of the Law of the Jungle. Like the stories, he has 3 children. However, one change is that Chil the Kite is his messenger.

Category:Fictional elephants Category:The Jungle Book characters Category:Fictional colonels Category:Fictional characters introduced in 1894 Category:Fictional recipients of the Victoria Cross

fr:Colonel Hathi it:Hathi

Name	Harland "Colonel" Sanders
Birth date	September 09, 1890
Birth place	Henryville, Indiana, U.S.
Death date	December 16, 1980
Death place	Louisville, Kentucky, U.S.
Nationality	American
Occupation	Entrepreneur
Religion	Disciples of Christ
Spouse	Josephine King (divorced) Claudia Price
Parents	Wilbur David Sanders Margaret Ann Sanders ''(née Dunlevy)''
Children	Harland David Sanders, Jr.Margaret SandersMildred Sanders Ruggles
Signature	Harland Sanders Signature.svg }}

Harland David "Colonel" Sanders (September 9, 1890 – December 16, 1980) was an American fast food businessman who founded the Kentucky Fried Chicken company, now re-branded as KFC. His image remains iconic in KFC promotions, and a foundation he established in his later years aids charities and funds scholarships with over a million dollars in grants a year.

Early life and career

Sanders was born to a Presbyterian family in Henryville, Indiana. His father, Wilbur David Sanders, died when Harland was six years old, and, since his mother worked, he was required to cook for his family. He dropped out of school in seventh grade. When his mother remarried, he ran away from home because his stepfather beat him. Sanders falsified his date of birth and enlisted in the United States Army at the age of sixteen, completing his entire service commitment in Cuba. During his early years, Sanders held many jobs, including: steamboat pilot, insurance salesman, railroad fireman and farmer. He had a son, Harland, Jr., who died at an early age, and two daughters, Margaret Sanders and Mildred Sanders Ruggles.

At the age of 40, Sanders cooked chicken dishes and other meals for people who stopped at his service station in Corbin, Kentucky. Since he did not have a restaurant, he served customers in his adjacent living quarters. His local popularity grew, and Sanders moved to a motel and 142 seat restaurant, later Harland Sanders Café and Museum. Over the next nine years he developed his "secret recipe" for frying chicken in a pressure fryer that cooked the chicken much faster than pan frying.

Sanders was given the honorary title "Kentucky Colonel" in 1935 by Governor Ruby Laffoon. He was "re-commissioned" in 1950 by Governor Lawrence Wetherby.

It wasn't until 1950 that Sanders began developing his distinctive appearance, growing his trademark mustache and goatee and donning a white suit and string tie. He never wore anything else in public during the last 20 years of his life, using a heavy wool suit in the winter and a light cotton suit in the summer.

At age 65, Sanders' store having failed due to the new Interstate 75 reducing his restaurant's customer traffic, he took $105 from his first Social Security check and began visiting potential franchisees.

Dave Thomas, later founder of Wendy's Old Fashioned Burgers, was offered a chance to turn around a failing Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant. He helped save the restaurant, and revolutionized the fast food industry by simplifying its menu from nearly one hundred items to just basic fried chicken and salads.

Sanders sold the Kentucky Fried Chicken corporation in 1964 for $2 million to a partnership of Kentucky businessmen headed by John Y. Brown, Jr. The deal did not include the Canadian operations. In 1965 Sanders moved to Mississauga, Ontario to oversee his Canadian franchises and continued to collect franchise and appearance fees there and appearance fees in the U.S. (He was locally active. For example, his 80th birthday was held at the Inn on the Park in North York, Ontario, hosted by Jerry Lewis as a Canadian Muscular Dystrophy Association fundraiser.) In 1973, he sued Heublein Inc. — then parent company of Kentucky Fried Chicken — over alleged misuse of his image in promoting products he had not helped develop. In 1975, Heublein Inc. unsuccessfully sued Sanders for libel after he publicly referred to their gravy as "sludge" with a "wallpaper taste".

Death and legacy

Sanders later used his stockholdings to create the Colonel Harland Sanders Trust and Colonel Harland Sanders Charitable Organization, which used the proceeds to aid charities and fund scholarships. His trusts continue to donate money to groups like the Trillium Health Care Centre; a wing of their building specializes in women's and children's care and has been named after him. The Sidney, British Columbia based foundation granted over $1,000,000 in 2007, according to its 2007 tax return.

Sanders died in Louisville, Kentucky, of pneumonia on December 16, 1980. He had been diagnosed with acute leukemia the previous June. His body lay in state in the rotunda of the Kentucky State Capitol; after a funeral service at the Southern Baptist Seminary Chapel attended by more than 1,000 people. He was buried in his characteristic white suit and black western string tie in Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville.

Since his death, Sanders has been portrayed by voice actors in Kentucky Fried Chicken commercials in radio and an animated version of him has been used for television commercials.

A 1982 episode of ''Little House on the Prairie'' ("Wave of the Future") paid tribute to KFC by featuring a character implied to be Col. Sanders (portrayed by John Roberts) offering Mrs. Oleson a fried chicken franchise. For legal reasons, this character was listed in the credits as "Bearded Man".

Sanders was inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 2000.

The Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball league has developed an urban legend of the "Curse of the Colonel". A statue of Colonel Sanders was thrown into the river and lost during a 1985 fan celebration, and (according to the legend) the "curse" has caused Japan's Hanshin Tigers to perform poorly since the incident.

References

;Notes

;Further reading

Pearce, John, ''The Colonel'' (1982) ISBN 0-385-18122-1

External links

Kentucky Fried Chicken

CBC Archives CBC Radio talks with Colonel Sanders about Canadian food and cooking (from 1957).

Harland Sanders Café and Museum, Corbin, KY

FBI file on "Colonel" Sanders

Category:1890 births Category:1980 deaths Category:American businesspeople Category:American food industry businesspeople Category:American Presbyterians [Category:Fast-food chain founders]] Category:Fast food advertising characters Category:Businesspeople from Kentucky Category:Kentucky colonels Category:Kentucky culture Category:American Disciples of Christ Category:People from Clark County, Indiana Category:People from Corbin, Kentucky Category:People from Louisville, Kentucky Category:United States Army soldiers Category:Deaths from leukemia Category:Burials at Cave Hill Cemetery Category:Cancer deaths in Kentucky Category:KFC

ar:كولونيل ساندرز bn:কর্নেল স্যান্ডার্‌স de:Harland D. Sanders es:Coronel Sanders fa:کلونل هارلند ساندرز fr:Colonel Sanders ko:커널 샌더스 nl:Colonel Sanders ja:カーネル・サンダース pl:Harland Sanders pt:Coronel Sanders ru:Полковник Сандерс sk:Harland David Sanders fi:Harland Sanders sv:Harland D. Sanders th:ฮาร์แลนด์ เดวิด แซนเดอร์ส vi:Harland Sanders zh:哈兰德·桑德斯

name	Mitch Miller
background	solo_singer
birth name	Mitchell William Miller
born	July 04, 1911Rochester, New York, United States
died	July 31, 2010New York City, United States
Death cause	short illness
instrument	English horn, oboe, vocals
genre	Choral, traditional pop
occupation	Musician, singer, conductor, record producer, record company executive
years active	1940s–1960s
associated acts	Mitch Miller and The GangSing Along with Mitch
notable instruments	}}

Mitchell William "Mitch" Miller (July 4, 1911 – July 31, 2010) was an American musician, singer, conductor, record producer, A&R; man and record company executive. Miller was one of the most influential figures in American popular music during the 1950s and early 1960s, both as the head of Artists and Repertoire at Columbia Records and as a best-selling recording artist with an NBC television series, ''Sing Along with Mitch''. A graduate of the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester in the early 1930s, Miller began his musical career as an accomplished player of the oboe and English horn, and recorded several highly regarded classical albums featuring his instrumental work, but he is best remembered as a conductor, choral director, television performer and recording executive.

Personal life

Mitch Miller was born in Rochester, New York, on July 4, 1911, to a Jewish family. His mother was Hinda Rosenblum Miller, a former seamstress, and his father, Abram Calmen Miller, a Russian-Jewish immigrant wrought-iron worker. He had four siblings, two of whom, Leon and Joseph, survived him.

He was married for sixty-five years to the former Frances Alexander, who died in 2000. They had two daughters; Andrea Miller, and Margaret Miller Reuther; and a son, Mitchell "Mike" Miller; and two grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. Mitch lived in New York City for many years and died there on July 31, 2010, after a short illness.

Career

Classical oboe

Miller took up the oboe at first as a teenager, because it was the only instrument available when he went to audition for his junior high school orchestra. A talented oboist, at age fifteen he played with the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra and after graduating from high school he attended the Eastman School of Music in Rochester. He graduated in 1932 with honors.

After graduating from Eastman, Miller played with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and then moved to New York City where he was a member of the Alec Wilder Octet (1938-40 and possibily longer), as well as performing with David Mannes, Andre Kostelanetz, Percy Faith, George Gershwin, Charlie Parker, and under Frank Sinatra's baton for the 1946 recording of "The Music of Alec Wilder."

Miller played the prominent English horn part in the ''largo'' movement of Dvořák's ''New World Symphony'' in a famous 1947 recording conducted by Leopold Stokowski.

As part of the CBS Symphony, Miller participated in the musical accompaniment in the infamous radio broadcast of Orson Welles's ''The War of the Worlds''.

A&R; man

Miller joined Mercury Records as a classical music producer and served as the head of Artists and Repertoire (A&R;) at Mercury in the late 1940s, and then joined Columbia Records in the same capacity in 1950. This was a pivotal position in a recording company, because the A&R; executive decided which musicians and songs would be recorded and promoted by that particular record label.

He defined the Columbia style through the early 1960s, signing and producing many important pop standards artists for Columbia, including Patti Page, Frankie Laine, Johnnie Ray, Ray Conniff, Percy Faith, Jimmy Boyd, Johnny Mathis, Tony Bennett, and Guy Mitchell (whose pseudonym was based on Miller's first name), and helped direct the careers of artists who were already signed to the label, like Doris Day, Dinah Shore and Jo Stafford, to just name a few. Miller also discovered Aretha Franklin and signed her to her first major recording contract. She left Columbia after a few years when Ahmet Ertegun of Atlantic Records promised her artistic freedom to create records outside the pop mainstream in a more rhythm-and-blues-driven direction.

Miller also was responsible for ''not'' pursuing certain artists and tunes: he disapproved of rock 'n' roll, and passed on Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly, who became stars on other labels. (He had offered Presley a contract, but balked at the amount Presley's manager, Colonel Tom Parker, was asking.) The one time that Miller was vetoed over his dislike for rock 'n' roll was when Bill Paley ordered him to sign the inter-racial Mexican rock group "Los Nómadas" since they could record rock records in both English and Spanish. Producer Bob Stanley had found the group during a series of early 1954 'Mexican civil rights concerts" in East Los Angeles. Their lead guitarist Bill Aken (adopted son of Mexican actress Lupe Mayorga, who was a friend of Paley's) was the only Caucasian in the Latino band. Although Mitch had once referred to the group as just "four arrogant little bastards," Miller softened his position regarding them when Paley's estimate of their record sales in Mexico proved to be highly accurate. In all fairness to Miller, it should be noted that it was due to his recommendation and a letter of reference to William Shuman that Aken's parents sent the young musician to the Juilliard School of Music.

Despite his distaste for rock 'n' roll, Miller often produced records for Columbia artists that were rockish in nature. Songs like "A White Sport Coat (and a Pink Carnation)" by Marty Robbins, and "Rock-a-Billy" by Guy Mitchell are just two examples.

Record producer

As a record producer, Miller gained a reputation for both innovation and gimmickry. Although he oversaw dozens of chart hits, his relentlessly cheery arrangements and his penchant for novelty material {for example, "Come on-a My House" (Rosemary Clooney), "Mama Will Bark" (Frank Sinatra)} has drawn heavy criticism from some admirers of traditional pop music. Music historian Will Friedwald wrote in his book ''Jazz Singing'' (Da Capo Press, 1996) that "Miller exemplified the worst in American pop. He first aroused the ire of intelligent listeners by trying to turn — and darn near succeeding in turning — great artists like Sinatra, Clooney, and Tony Bennett into hacks. Miller chose the worst songs and put together the worst backings imaginable — not with the hit-or-miss attitude that bad musicians ... traditionally used, but with insight, forethought, careful planning, and perverted brilliance."

At the same time, Friedwald acknowledges Miller's great influence on later popular music production:

Miller established the primacy of the producer, proving that even more than the artist, the accompaniment, or the material, it was the responsibility of the man in the recording booth whether a record flew or flopped. Miller also conceived of the idea of the pop record "sound" per se: not so much an arrangement or a tune, but an aural texture (usually replete with extramusical gimmicks) that could be created in the studio and then replicated in live performance, instead of the other way around. Miller was hardly a rock 'n' roller, yet without these ideas there could never have been rock 'n' roll. "Mule Train", Miller's first major hit (for Frankie Laine) and the foundation of his career, set the pattern for virtually the entire first decade of rock. The similarities between it and, say, "Leader of the Pack", need hardly be outlined here.

While Miller's methods were resented by some of Columbia's performers, including Frank Sinatra and Rosemary Clooney, the label maintained a high hit-to-release ratio during the 1950s. Sinatra, in particular, would speak harshly of Miller and blamed him for his (Sinatra's) temporary fall from popularity while at Columbia, having been forced to record material like "Mama Will Bark" and "The Hucklebuck." Miller countered that Sinatra's contract gave him the right to refuse any song.

Recording artist

In the early 1950s Miller recorded with Columbia's house band as "Mitchell Miller and His Orchestra". He also recorded a string of successful albums and singles, featuring a male chorale and his own distinctive arrangements, under the name "Mitch Miller and the Gang" starting in 1950. The ensemble's hits included "The Children's Marching Song" (more commonly known as "This Old Man"), "Tzena, Tzena, Tzena", "The Yellow Rose of Texas", and the two marches from ''The Bridge on the River Kwai'': "The River Kwai March" and "Colonel Bogey March". His version of "The Yellow Rose of Texas" topped the US ''Billboard'' chart, sold over one million copies in the US alone, and reached #2 in the UK Singles Chart.

In 1961, Miller also provided two choral tracks set to Dimitri Tiomkin's title music on the soundtrack to ''The Guns of Navarone''. In 1962 they sang the theme of ''The Longest Day'' over the end credits. In 1965 they sang the "Major Dundee March", the theme song to Sam Peckinpah's ''Major Dundee''. Though the film was a box-office bomb, paradoxically the song remained popular for years. In 1987, Miller conducted the London Symphony Orchestra with pianist David Golub in a well-received recording of Gershwin's "An American in Paris," "Rhapsody in Blue," and "Concerto in F."

''Sing Along with Mitch''

In the early 1960s, Miller became a household name with his NBC television show ''Sing Along with Mitch'', a community-sing program featuring him and a male chorale (an extension of his highly successful series of Columbia record albums of the same name). During the second season of ''Sing Along with Mitch'', Miller himself coined the catchphrase "all smiles."

Singer Leslie Uggams, pianist Dick Hyman, and the singing Quinto Sisters were featured on ''Sing Along with Mitch''. One of the singers in Miller's chorale, Bob McGrath, later went on to a successful career on the PBS children's show Sesame Street.

''Sing Along with Mitch'' ran on television from 1961 until it was canceled in 1964, a victim of changing musical tastes. Selected repeats aired briefly on NBC during the spring of 1966. However, the show's primary audience was over the age of 40 and it did not gain the favor of advertisers targeting the youth market. The show's format remained popular in England, where comedian Max Bygraves hosted his own version, ''Sing Along with Max''.

Miller left Columbia Records in 1965 and joined MCA Inc. as a consultant signing the same year with MCA's Decca Records subsidiary.

In later years, Miller would carry on the sing-along tradition, leading crowds in song in personal appearances. For several years, Miller was featured in a popular series of Christmas festivities in New Bedford, Massachusetts, leading large crowds singing carols. Miller appeared as host of two PBS television specials, "Keep America Singing" (1994) and "Voices In Harmony" (1996), featuring champion quartets and choruses of SPEBSQSA and Sweet Adelines International. He also appeared conducting regional orchestras and filled in many times as guest conductor of The Boston Pops Orchestra.

Parodies

Steve Allen once performed a pointed satire of ''Sing Along with Mitch'' that spoofed the show's production values, including cameras panning among the vocalists, going out of control and knocking them over, then chasing Allen, made up as Miller, out of the studio and onto the roof. Stan Freberg, who had previously recorded "Wunnerful! Wunnerful!", a scathing satire of ''The Lawrence Welk Show'', presented an equally brutal satire of the show, "Sing Along With Freeb", on his February 1962 ABC special, ''The Chun King Chow Mein Hour''. Jonathan and Darlene Edwards (Paul Weston and Jo Stafford) produced an entire album of sing-along in the Miller style, which supposedly greatly angered him.

In 1999, Amazon.com referenced ''Sing Along with Mitch'' in Christmas commercials featuring a male choral group nicknamed the "Sweatermen" singing subtitled songs about the company.

Awards and honors

Miller received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000.

He was awarded Honorary Membership in the Barbershop Harmony Society in 1985.

Quotation

"Rock 'n' roll is musical baby food: it is the worship of mediocrity, brought about by a passion for conformity." ''NME'' – January 1958

References

External links

Brief info on show

Longer biography

Legacy Recordings biography

Internet Movie Database entry

Mitch Miller Archive of American Television Video Interview

Mitch Miller on the bouncing ball

Category:1911 births Category:2010 deaths Category:American male singers Category:American record producers Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:American Jews Category:Jewish American musicians Category:American singers Category:American classical oboists Category:Musicians from New York Category:People from Rochester, New York Category:A&R; people Category:Eastman School of Music alumni

da:Mitch Miller de:Mitch Miller es:Mitch Miller it:Mitch Miller nl:Mitch Miller no:Mitch Miller pt:Mitch Miller fi:Mitch Miller sv:Mitch Miller

Lawrence B. "Larry" Wilkerson (15 June 1945 in Gaffney, South Carolina) is a retired United States Army Colonel and former chief of staff to United States Secretary of State Colin Powell. Wilkerson has criticized many aspects of the Iraq War, including his own preparation of Powell's presentation to the UN.

Education and military service

After three years of studying philosophy and English literature at Bucknell University, Wilkerson dropped out in 1966 and volunteered to serve in the Vietnam War. He told the ''Washington Post'': "I felt an obligation because my dad had fought, and I thought that was kind of your duty."

Wilkerson arrived as an Army officer piloting an OH-6A Cayuse observation helicopter and logged about 1100 combat hours over a year. He flew low and slow through Vietnam, and was involved in one incident in which he says he prevented a war crime by purposely placing his helicopter between a position that was full of civilians, and another helicopter that wanted to launch an attack on the position. He also had many vocal disagreements with his superiors and his own gunner crew over free-fire zones, including an incident in which one of his crew shot a wagon that wound up having a little girl inside of it.. He went on to Airborne School and Ranger School before receiving his Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature and graduate degrees in international relations and national security. He attended the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island and later returned there to teach. He later served as deputy director of the Marine Corps War College at Quantico.

Wilkerson spent some years in the United States Navy's Pacific Command in South Korea, Japan and Hawaii, where he was well regarded by his superiors. These recommendations led in early 1989 to a successful interview to become the assistant to Colin Powell, who was then finishing his stint as National Security Advisor in the Reagan administration and moving to a position in the United States Army Forces Command at Fort McPherson. He continued this supporting role as Powell became Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff through the Gulf War, following Powell into civilian life and then back into public service when President George W. Bush appointed Powell Secretary of State.

Wilkerson was responsible for a review of information from the Central Intelligence Agency that was used to prepare Powell for his February 2003 presentation to the United Nations Security Council. His failure to realize that the evidence was faulty has been attributed on the limited time (only one week) that he had to review the data. The subsequent developments led Wilkerson to become disillusioned: "Combine the detainee abuse issue with the ineptitude of post-invasion planning for Iraq, wrap both in this blanket of secretive decision-making...and you get the overall reason for my speaking out."

Post-government statements

Since his retirement from the public sector Wilkerson has on several occasions spoken out against what he perceives as the poor planning and execution of the Iraq War as well as the global politics leading up to and following it. In particular he has denounced the decision-making process of the Bush Administration and Vice President Dick Cheney's and Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld's part in it.

Treatment of detainees in Iraq

Wilkerson made comments in November 2005 to the effect that the Vice President had decided that the Third Geneva Convention (regarding treatment of POWs) would not apply to "al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda look-alike detainees" and that the February 2002 White House memorandum regarding the "Humane Treatment of Taliban and al Qaeda Detainees" contained a loophole designed to avoid applying the Geneva convention to the detainees. According to Wilkerson, the phrase "the detainees (should) be treated humanely and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of Geneva" was a way to appear to play by the rules while in reality, the "military necessities" would always overrule concerns about the plight of the detainees. Wilkerson said that this was result of Cheney and Rumsfeld working in collaboration to undermine the standard decision-making process of the White House (which included his superior, Colin Powell).

Iraq war intelligence was "a hoax"

During an October 19, 2005 speech at the New America Foundation, Wilkerson criticized the intelligence community which compiled the Iraq War intelligence.

In a 2006 interview Wilkerson said that the speech Powell made before the United Nations on February 5, 2003—which laid out a case for war with Iraq—included falsehoods of which Powell had never been made aware. He said, "My participation in that presentation at the UN constitutes the lowest point in my professional life. I participated in a hoax on the American people, the international community and the United Nations Security Council." Wilkerson said in 2011 that his preparing of the presentation was "probably the biggest mistake of my life", he regrets it, and that he regrets not resigning over it.

He stated in the 2006 interview that neither CIA Director George Tenet nor the CIA analysts that gave Powell information on mobile biological laboratories explained that there were disputes about the reliability of the informants who had supplied the information—information which was used in the speech.

Wilkerson also agreed with the interviewer that Cheney's frequent trips to the CIA would have brought "undue influence" on the agency. When asked if Cheney was "the kind of guy who could lean on somebody" he responded, "Absolutely. And be just as quiet and taciturn about it as-- he-- as he leaned on 'em. As he leaned on the Congress recently-- in the-- torture issue."

Wilkerson stood by his earlier description of Cheney and Rumsfeld as having formed a cabal to hijack the decision-making process: "I'm worried and I would rather have the discussion and debate in the process we've designed than I would a diktat from a dumb strongman... I'd prefer to see the squabble of democracy to the efficiency of dictators."

An Iranian overture, 2003

Wilkerson said in an interview on BBC Newsnight, January 17, 2007, that an Iranian offer to help stabilise Iraq after the American invasion, was positively received at the State Department, yet turned down by Dick Cheney. The reported offer consisted of help in stabilizing Iraq, cutting ties with Hezbollah and greater transparency in its nuclear program in return for lifting sanctions and dismantling the Mujahedeen-e Khalq, an organisation working to overthrow the Iranian government. When this offer was made, numerous middle-east experts were warning of the coming shift in power in Iran toward the right-wing Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who would assume power shortly thereafter.

Lack of congressional oversight

Wilkerson is one of the people interviewed in the 2007 documentary film ''No End in Sight'', a film that is very critical of the way the occupation of Iraq was handled in the spring of 2003.

Proposes impeachment

".... You compare Bill Clinton's peccadilloes for which he was impeached to George Bush's high crimes and misdemeanors or Dick Cheney's high crimes and misdemeanors, and I think they pale in significance."

Commentary on the documentary "Why We Fight"

Wilkerson did a full-length audio commentary for the documentary ''Why We Fight''. This film won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.

In April 2007, Wilkerson was featured in VPRO's ''Tegenlicht'' Dutch documentary ''The Israel Lobby''. He said that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) was highly influential in the Bush Administration's decision to go to war in Iraq. He also cited, as to the extent of their influence, an occasion in which he was threatened with censure when he criticized Israel in a lecture he was giving.

Guantanamo continues to hold innocent men

The ''Associated Press'' reports that on March 16, 2009, Wilkerson wrote on The Washington Note that he knew from briefings as a Bush administration official that it was soon recognized that some of the captives were innocent. According to the ''Associated Press'' summary, Wilkerson said the Bush administration was willing to continue to detain innocent men who might nevertheless be aware of useful information about the Afghanistan "mosaic": :{| class="wikitable" border="1" |

"It did not matter if a detainee were innocent. Indeed, because he lived in Afghanistan and was captured on or near the battle area, he must know something of importance."

"...sufficient information about a village, a region, or a group of individuals, that dots could be connected and terrorists or their plots could be identified."

|}

Wilkerson stated that Guantanamo continues to hold innocent men. Wilkerson said that he felt compelled to come forward after hearing former Vice President Dick Cheney state that President Barack Obama's plans to close Guantanamo made the public less safe.

Commander Jeffrey Gordon, a Guantanamo spokesman, declined to comment on Wilkerson's specific observations. According to an ''Associated Press'' paraphrase of Gordon's statement, he said that, "dealing with foreign fighters from a wide variety of countries in a wartime setting was a complex process."

Politics and Personal Life

In September 2006 in a conference call Wilkerson expressed support for Wesley Clark and Anthony Zinni. He also endorsed Jim Webb against incumbent George Allen in the 2006 U.S. Senate election in Virginia.

Wilkerson is a visiting professor at the College of William & Mary, teaching courses on U.S. national security. He is a Professorial Lecturer in the Honors Program at the George Washington University, teaching a course named "National Security Decision Making." He and his wife Barbara have two children. His son is an Air Force navigator while his daughter was in the Army but has since returned to civilian life.

Wilkerson also heads the Colin Powell Leadership Club, a group of MacFarland middle school students in Washington, D.C.

See also

References

External links

Department of State Biography: Lawrence B. Wilkerson, November 28, 2003.

''SourceWatch'' profile of Lawrence Wilkerson

"Colonel Finally Saw Whites of Their Eyes", Dana Milbank, The Washington Post, 20 October 2005

"War is Not About Truth, Justice and the American Way", interview with The Real News

Transcript of Wilkerson's speech at the ''New America Foundation'', ''Washington Note Archives'', October 19, 2005.

Lawrence Wilkerson. "The White House Cabal", ''Los Angeles Times'', October 25, 2005.

Transcript of Wilkerson interview, BBC ''Today'' program, 29 November 2005

Interview with Lawrence Wilkerson: "A Leaderless, Directionless Superpower", ''Der Spiegel'', December 6, 2005

"Breaking Ranks", The Washington Post, 19 January 2006

Transcript of Wilkerson Interview, PBS NOW (series), "Iraq Pre-War Intelligence," February 3, 2006. "... I'd prefer to see the squabble of democracy to the efficiency of dictators."

"They Have Stolen My Party and I Want it Back", blog piece, The Washington Note, 22 March 2006

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/26/wilkerson-vp/

Official website of the "Why We Fight" documentary from 2005. The DVD released on June 27, 2005, includes a commentary by Col. Wilkerson.

Interview where Colonel Wilkerson gives examples of Cheney and Rumsfeld's influence., National Public Radio, November 3, 2005.

Top U.S. officials working for Israel, Antiwar.com, 4 July 2010.

Category:1945 births Category:Living people Category:People from Gaffney, South Carolina Category:United States Army officers Category:United States Department of State officials Category:American military personnel of the Vietnam War Category:George Washington University faculty Category:American people of the Iraq War Category:Naval War College alumni Category:American whistleblowers Category:The College of William & Mary faculty

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