Randazzo
—  Comune  —
Comune di Randazzo
Randazzo.
Randazzo Location of Randazzo in Italy
Coordinates: 37°53′N 14°57′E / 37.883°N 14.95°E / 37.883; 14.95Coordinates: 37°53′N 14°57′E / 37.883°N 14.95°E / 37.883; 14.95
Country	Italy
Region	Sicily
Province	Catania (CT)
Frazioni	Flascio, Monte la Guardia, Murazzorotto
Government
• Mayor	Ernesto Del Campo
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code	95036
Dialing code	095
Patron saint	St. Joseph
Saint day	March 19
Website	Official website

Randazzo (Sicilian: Rannazzu) is a town and comune of Sicily, Italy, in the province of Catania. It is situated at the northern foot of Mount Etna, 70 km NW of Catania by rail. It is the nearest town to the summit of Etna, and is one of the points from which the ascent may be made.

History[link]

This section requires expansion.

In the 13th century the town had its own army, which fought in favor of the king against the rebels. In 1210 King Frederick II of Hohenstaufen and his young wife Constance of Aragon sheltered at Randazzo to escape the terrible plague which raged in Palermo.

Randazzo became one of the most densely populated towns in the island, after Palermo and Messina. The town was also divided into three main districts: the Greeks lived in St. Nicola's quarter, the Latins in St. Mary's and the Lombards in St. Martin's.

During the Black Death of 1575-1580 the population of Randazzo declined. The economy slumped, and Randazzo almost turned into a ghost town.^{[citation needed]}

During World War II, Randazzo was bombed by the Allies, destroying or damaging 76% of its buildings.

Historic buildings[link]

• Church of Santa Maria. It has a façade completely built of black lava stone, three polygonal apses in the form of towers and 15th-century side portals in the Catalan-Gothic style. The huge interior is divided into three naves by black monolithic columns, and preserves statues by the Gagini school and six paintings by Giuseppe Velasquez (1750–1827).
• Church of San Martino. It has a 14th-century bell tower, by some acclaimed as the most beautiful in Italy.
• Church of Santa Nicola, the largest in the town, originally established in the 14th century but rebuilt in 1585. It houses works by Antonello and Giacomo Gagini, and in the right nave a triptych by Messinese painters
• Castello Svevo ("Hohenstaufen Castle"), the only one remaining of the eight medieval towers, on a high lava rock, already existing at the time of Frederick II of Hohenstaufen. For a time it was the seat of the Giustiziere del Valdemone (a kind of medieval judge and governor) and a prison, then became the mansion of the Romeo e Vagliasindi families, to become again a prison in later centuries: a sinister building, with tiny cells, a torture chamber, the well for those who were sentenced to be bricked up alive. After a recent restoration the castle is used today as an exhibition center and houses a collection of "Pupi siciliani" and the Paolo Vagliasindi archeological museum.

Main sights[link]

• Aragonese Gate
• Palazzo Lanza
• Palazzo Scala, a former Royal residence from the 12th century.
• Palazzo Finocchiaro (1509).
• The Castello Svevo ("Hohenstaufen Castle")

Gallery[link]

Church of Santa Maria   Church of San Martino   Church of Santa Nicola   Former Town Gateway   Castello Svevo   Cell in Castello Svevo, where prisoners were walled in to starve to death

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Randazzo

Alessandro "Teddy" Randazzo (May 13, 1935 - November 21, 2003) was a NYC ^[1] born pop songwriter who composed 1960s hit songs such as "Goin' Out of My Head", "It's Gonna Take a Miracle", "Pretty Blue Eyes", and "Hurt So Bad".

Early years[link]

In the early years of rock and roll, Randazzo played with a group called The Three Chuckles and appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show numerous times. Their first hit "Runaround", was a top 20 hit. As a solo artist, he had three singles that made the Billboard Top 100: "Little Serenade" (#66) in 1958, "The Way Of A Clown" (#44) in 1960 and "Big Wide World" (#51) in 1963. He co-starred in rock revues staged by the legendary disc jockey Alan Freed, appearing with such artists as Chuck Berry and LaVern Baker. Randazzo also had some starring roles and often performed in such rock films as Hey, Let's Twist, The Girl Can't Help It, Rock, Rock, Rock and Mr. Rock and Roll in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Hit-making years[link]

Randazzo wrote a string of major hits for other artists with composing partner, Bobby Weinstein ^[2], including "Pretty Blue Eyes", a top ten hit for Steve Lawrence. He penned many songs for Little Anthony and the Imperials, producing and arranging several albums for the group in the mid-60s. The hit songs included "Goin' Out of My Head" (#6 Pop, #22 R&B), which was covered by numerous artists including The Zombies and Frank Sinatra; "Hurt So Bad" (#10 Pop, #3 R&B), which was covered by The Lettermen (#12 in 1969), as well as Linda Ronstadt who took it to #8 in 1980; and the Imperials' Top 20 hits, "I'm On The Outside (Looking In)" and "Take Me Back". The Lettermen combined "Goin' Out of My Head" with Frankie Valli's hit, "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" in a medley which reached #7 in 1968.

He arranged and produced two albums on MGM Records with Baltimore girl group, The Royalettes including the Top 50 hit "It's Gonna Take A Miracle" in 1965. He gave the group a big production sound with a full orchestra (compared to sparer instrumentation for Little Anthony recordings), but despite critical acclaim and good reviews for their live shows, the group failed to achieve a major commercial success. "I Want To Meet Him", the follow-up in 1966, reached the Hot 100 and the Top 30 R&B charts. "Miracle" was revived in 1982 by Deniece Williams, who took it to the number 1 R&B spot and #10 in the Hot 100.

All of the 27 songs that Randazzo produced on the two albums, plus another issued on single, appeared on a CD retrospective of the Royalettes' complete MGM output released by UK label, RPM in late 2010.

Many of Randazzo's tunes became pop classics, recorded by a gamut of industry giants from Ella Fitzgerald to (as mentioned previously) Frank Sinatra. "I've lost count on how many versions there are", Randazzo once said of "Goin' Out Of My Head". It is now included in the Top 50 most recorded songs with sales of over 100 million by over 400 artists, according to the Songwriters' Hall Of Fame.

Randazzo wrote "Yesterday Has Gone", which was recorded by UK band Cupid's Inspiration in 1968 and climbed to #4 in the UK pop chart. Later, he provided several songs for albums by New York soul group, The Manhattans, during their 1970s' hey-day, including the 1977 hit, "It Feels So Good To Be Loved So Bad" (#6 R&B, #66 Pop), "There's No Good In Goodbye", "A Million To One" to name a few. He also wrote and produced for the Stylistics. Albums include "Fashionably Yours" and "Love Spell." At this time, Teddy co-wrote songs with his then girlfriend, Victoria Pike and songwriters Roger Joyce and Souren Mozian.

During the early and mid 60's, Randazzo toured extensively with his own band appearing at the Copacabana, New York, Hotel Americana, San Juan and regularly at the Thunderbird Hotel, Las Vegas. Band members included renowned musicians: Larry Taylor, Gerry McGee, Tommy Boyce, Bobby Hart, Vince Megna, Billy Lewis, Kenny Rankin, Bobby Weinstein and Billy Barberis.

Later life and death[link]

Randazzo married R. Shelly Kunewa ^[3] of Hawaii and divided his time between their home in the islands and their home in Florida for most of the latter half of his life. He continued writing and producing. Randazzo produced and arranged the "Honolulu City Lights" album (for Tom Moffat's Paradise Records Label] The song was a hit, the album has become a classic. In 2004, the editors of Honolulu Magazine asked a panel of distinguished recording industry veterans to rank their choices for the best Hawaii album of all time. "Honolulu City Lights" was chosen #1.

Randazzo died at age 68 at his home in Orlando, Florida.

Songwriters Hall of Fame[link]

Randazzo and his writing partner, Bobby Weinstein, were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2007, fifty years after they first started writing songs together.

See also[link]

• List of Italian American entertainers

Sources[link]

• Teddy Randazzo obituary
• Bio of Teddy Randazzo
• Songwriters Hall of Fame

References[link]

1. ^ NYC vital records
2. ^ BMI and Songwriters Hall Of Fame
3. ^ Honolulu Advertiser

External links[link]

• Teddy Randazzo at Find a Grave
• Biography at Allmusic website
• Teddy Randazzo at Spectropop

Thom Hartmann
Thom Hartmann on set of his television program "The Big Picture".
Born	(1951-05-07) May 7, 1951 (age 61) Grand Rapids, Michigan, U.S.
Occupation	Radio/TV host, political commentator, author, former psychotherapist, former entrepreneur
Spouse	Louise Hartmann
Website
thomhartmann.com

Thom Hartmann (born May 7, 1951) is an American radio host, author, former psychotherapist and entrepreneur, and progressive political commentator. His nationally-syndicated radio show, The Thom Hartmann Program, airs in the United States and has 2.75 million listeners a week.^[1] In 2008, 2009, and 2010, Talkers Magazine named Hartmann the tenth most important talk show host in America,^[2] and number 8 in 2011 defining him as the most important liberal host for four years in a row (the ones above Hartmann are conservatives).

Hartmann's article "Talking Back To Talk Radio" became part of the original business plan of Air America Radio. He replaced Al Franken on the network on February 19, 2007. On March 1, 2009, Hartmann moved syndication of his show from Air America to the former Jones Network, now owned by Dial Global (which also syndicates Neal Boortz, Ed Schultz, Michael Smerconish, Bill Press, Stephanie Miller, and Clark Howard). In the summer of 2009, his program began to also be offered to nonprofit stations via the Pacifica Radio network, and some community/nonprofit stations in the US are also carrying his show. The radio program is also simulcast as a TV program by Free Speech TV^[3] on Dish Network and DirecTV. Additionally, he stars in a one-hour daily TV show which his production company records at the studios of and licenses to the RT news network, The Big Picture; that TV show is also syndicated by Free Speech TV and carried on both Dish Network and local cable TV stations.

Hartmann is a lay scholar of the history and textual analysis of the United States Constitution; attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); Thomas Jefferson; the Assassination of John F. Kennedy; the Federalist Papers; electronic voting rigging; and environmental issues like global warming. He has authored many books on political topics and ADHD. He is the inventor of the Hunter vs. farmer theory of the condition.

Early life[link]

Hartmann was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the son of a staunch conservative Republican, atheist father and a Christian mother,^[4] and grew up in nearby Lansing. His paternal grandparents were from Norway.^[5] Interested in politics from a young age, he campaigned for Barry Goldwater during the 1964 presidential election when he was 13.^[6] By 1968, Hartmann was studying at Michigan State University and working as a part-time news announcer at local country music station WITL while protesting the Vietnam War with Students for a Democratic Society (SDS).^[7]

Beliefs[link]

Hartmann is considered to have progressive/liberal politics (although he describes himself as part of the radical middle).^[8] He is the author of numerous books including Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights, in which he argues that the 1886 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company (118 U.S. 394) did not actually grant corporate personhood, and that this doctrine derives from a mistaken interpretation of a Supreme Court clerk's notes. Hartmann considers this a clear contradiction of the intent of the Founding Fathers of the United States.^[9] He has also written on the separation of church and state, drawing upon the Federalist Papers to argue that the Founding Fathers warned against the notion of the United States being a Christian nation. He contends that the 2000 American election and 2004 American election were stolen through electronic tampering, denial of the voting franchise by rigged voting lists, and limiting availability of voting machines in selected precincts. He also accuses the Bush administration of eroding democracy and individual freedoms.

Hartmann is also a vocal critic of the effects of neoliberal globalization on the U.S. economy, claiming that economic policies enacted during and since the presidency of Ronald Reagan have led, in large part, to many American industrial enterprises' being acquired by multinational firms based in overseas countries, leading in many cases to manufacturing jobs' – once considered a major foundation of the U.S. economy – being relocated to countries in Asia and other areas where the costs of labor are lower than in the U.S.; and the concurrent reversal of the United States' traditional role of a leading exporter of finished manufactured goods to that of a primary importer of finished manufactured goods (exemplified by massive trade deficits with countries such as China). Hartmann argues that this phenomenon is leading to the erosion of the American middle class, whose survival Hartmann deems critical to the survival of American democracy. This argument is expressed in Hartmann's 2006 book, Screwed: The Undeclared War Against The Middle Class and What We Can Do About It. One of the book's main arguments is that media deregulation leads to corporate media's shifting the American consensus towards the acceptance of privatization and massive corporate profits – which causes the shrinking of the middle class.

In the book Ultimate Sacrifice, he and co-author Lamar Waldron argue that President John F. Kennedy's assassination resulted from a conspiracy by two mafia godfathers (Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante, Jr.) who took advantage of a proposed 1963 USA-sponsored coup (against Cuba's Fidel Castro) to kill the President and then hide their tracks in the resulting cover-up of the top-secret coup plans. Gore Vidal, in his recent autobiography "Point To Point Navigation" devotes much of the final two chapters of his book to praising Hartmann's and Lamar Waldron's scholarship in "solving" the JFK case (JFK was a friend of Vidal's).

Talk radio career[link]

Thom Hartmann doing his radio show, the Thom Hartmann Program.

Hartmann started in radio as a DJ (country, rock, progressive overnight) in 1968 in Lansing, Michigan, (on WITL, WVIC, WFMK) and program director at WNBY and worked full or part-time in radio while also attending school and/or running businesses in Michigan for a decade. He returned to radio in February 2003 with a show on a local station in Vermont, then a month later picked up the noon-3 PM ET slot on the i.e. America Radio Network and Sirius Satellite Radio. In 2005, he moved from Vermont to Oregon and, in addition to continuing his national show, also co-hosted a local talk show in Portland, Oregon (with Carl Wolfson, the late Heidi Tauber, and later Christine Alexander), from 2005 until early 2007 on KPOJ, initially an affiliate of Air America Radio owned by Clear Channel Communications. The KPOJ local morning 6 – 9 AM PT is now hosted by Carl Wolfson. In late 2010 Hartmann moved his show from Portland to Washington D.C.^{[citation needed]}

Hartmann's national program, on the air since 2003 and now in the 3PM to 6PM ET daypart, was chosen by Air America to replace Al Franken on most Air America affiliates in 2007.^[10] Some stations, such as The Quake in San Francisco, had already dropped or moved Franken for Hartmann, who now is, according to Talkers Magazine, America's most important liberal talker. As of March 2012, the show was carried on 81 terrestrial radio stations in 34 states as well as on Sirius and XM satellite radio. A community radio station in Africa, Radio Builsa in Ghana, also broadcasts the show. Various local cable TV networks simulcast the program.

According to his syndicator Dial Global, more people listen to Hartmann's show on more stations than any other progressive talk show in America. The Thom Hartmann Show is estimated by industry magazine Talkers to have 2.75 million unique listers per week. In addition to Dial Global, a subsidiary of Triton Media Group, the show is now also offered via Pacifica Audioport to non-profit stations in a non-profit compliant format and is simulcast on Dish Network Channel 9415 via Free Speech TV Network.

Many guests appear on the show purporting points of view on diverse social and political topics. Some guests proffer progressive views similar to Hartmann's, but more than half are conservatives, libertarians, or Ayn Rand Institute members^[11] who espouse opposing views. A vigorous debate with the host usually ensues. There are four regular guests on the program, and they are sympathetic to Hartmann's political views. Sen. Bernie Sanders (Ind.-VT) appears every Friday during the first hour of the show titled "Brunch with Bernie". Ellen Ratner of the Talk Radio News Service provides Washington commentary daily. Victoria Jones who is the White House correspondent for Talk Radio News Service appears occasionally as does Dr. Ravi Batra an economics professor at SMU.

Like all talk radio shows, The Thom Hartmann Program takes calls from listeners. When callers asked Thom how he was, he used to reply, "I'm great, but I'll get better." But after a time callers would regularly try to elicit this response so he's stopped replying this way routinely. Hartmann ends each show with the phrase, "Activism begins with you, democracy begins with you. Get out there, get active! Tag, you're it!"

TV program[link]

Hartmann produces a one hour daily TV show, The Big Picture with Thom Hartmann, which is seen worldwide on the Russian-based RT news channel, as well as on Free Speech TV; through Free Speech TV it is also seen on selected local-origination and Public-access television cable TV channels.

Business career[link]

Hartmann began his business career in the early 1970s while in his 20s, co-founding The Woodley Herber Company. Woodley Herber sold herbal products, potpourris and teas, and operated until 1978. It was during this time that Hartmann obtained three degrees in herbology and homeopathic medicine, one of which was from a diploma mill. Thereafter Hartmann moved to New Hampshire to begin The New England Salem Children's Village,^[12] which still operates in Rumney, New Hampshire. He was Executive Director of NESCT for five years, and on its board for over 25 years. NESCT's child-care model was based on that of the German Salem International organization, and through his affiliation with that group he helped start international relief programs in Uganda, Colombia, Russia, Israel, India, Australia, and several other countries between 1979 and today.

Hartmann founded International Wholesale Travel and its retail subsidiary Sprayberry Travel in Atlanta in 1983, a business which in the intervening years^{[clarification needed]} has generated over a quarter of a billion dollars in revenue.^{[citation needed]} According to their website, Sprayberry Travel was lauded by the Wall Street Journal in 1984 for being one of the early adopters of frequent travel programs analogous to the recently initiated frequent flyer programs of the airline industry.^[13] He sold his share in the business in 1986 and retired with his family to Germany to work with the international relief organization Salem International.^[14] In the late 1970s, he had been a trainer in advertising and marketing for The American Marketing Centers (now defunct), and in 1987 after returning from Germany founded the Atlanta advertising agency Chandler, MacDonald, Stout, Schneiderman & Poe, Inc., which did business as The Newsletter Factory.^[15] He sold his interest in that company in 1996 and retired to Vermont.

Other areas of notability[link]

Hartmann is a writer who has published more than twenty books on diverse topics. The title which won the most critical acclaim is The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight. In 1999 he was invited by the Dalai Lama to spend a week in Dharamsala after the Dalai Lama finished reading this book. Hartmann won the Project Censored Award in 2004 for Unequal Protection. As a result of a book on spirituality, The Prophet's Way, he was invited in 1998 to meet Pope John Paul II.

Trained in the 1970s in Neuro-Linguistic Programming by Richard Bandler (Hartmann is licensed by Bandler's Society of NLP as both an NLP Practitioner and an NLP Trainer, and Bandler wrote the foreword to his book "Healing ADD"), Hartmann popularized some of its concepts in Cracking the Code (2007), which argues that Newt Gingrich and Frank Luntz made use of them in the 1980s and 1990s for Republican Party causes and advocates using them to advance liberalism. His book "Healing ADD" also leans heavily on NLP techniques. His book on the JFK Assassination (written with Lamar Waldron) titled "Ultimate Sacrifice" is cited extensively in the last two chapters of Gore Vidal's recent autobiography as having "finally solved" that case.

Hartmann was one of several contributors to Air America, the Playbook, a 300 plus page collection of essays, transcripts, and interviews by liberal radio personalities. It was published shortly before the 2006 Congressional elections and was on The New York Times Best Seller list for October 8, 2006.^[16]

Leonardo DiCaprio made a web movie titled "Global Warning" that was inspired by The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight. Hartmann appears in DiCaprio's 2007 documentary The 11th Hour, as well as the feature documentary film Dalai Lama Renaissance (with Harrison Ford), and Crude Impact.

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder[link]

Hartmann has authored in the area of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and adult attention-deficit disorder (AADD) and is the creator (first proposed by him in 1978, first published nationally in 1992) of the now well-known hunter vs. farmer theory that ADD is an expected evolutionary adaptation to hunting lifestyles. These individuals have the ability of rapidly shifting their focus and external attention and of holding multiple trains of thought. This ability causes difficulties when they must live and work in cultures in which "farming" – well-planned, predictable, organized and repetitive behaviors – is typical. His first book on the disorder, Attention Deficit Disorder: a Different Perception was described by Scientific American as "innovative and fresh".^[17] Hartmann has established specialized schools^[quantify] for children with ADHD, such as The Hunter School in Rumney, New Hampshire,^[18] which he co-founded with his wife Louise.

He also operated the "ADD Forum" and "DeskTop Publishing Forum", along with several others, on CompuServe.^[19]

Bibliography[link]

• 2011: Rebooting the American Dream: 11 Ways to Rebuild Our Country. Berrett-Koehler. ISBN 978-1-60509-706-0. 
• 2010 (second edition): Unequal Protection: How Corporations Became "People" – And How You Can Fight Back. Berrett-Koehler. ISBN 1-60509-559-1. 
• 2009: Threshold: The Crisis of Western Culture. Viking. ISBN 0-670-02091-5. 
• 2008: Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination (by Lamar Waldron with Thom Hartmann). Counterpoint. ISBN 1-58243-535-9. 
• 2007: Cracking The Code: How to Win Hearts, Change Minds, and Restore America's Original Vision. Berrett-Koehler. ISBN 978-1-57675-458-0. 
• 2006: Screwed: The Undeclared War Against The Middle Class and What We Can Do About It. Berrett-Koehler. ISBN 1-57675-414-6. 
• 2006: Walking Your Blues Away: Practical Bilateral Therapies for Healing the Mind and Optimizing Emotional Well-Being. Park Street Press. ISBN 1-59477-144-8. 
• 2005: Ultimate Sacrifice: John and Robert Kennedy, the Plan for a Coup in Cuba, and the Murder of JFK. Carroll & Graf. ISBN 0-7867-1441-7.  by Lamar Waldron, with Thom Hartmann
• 2004: What Would Jefferson Do?. Harmony Books. ISBN 1-882109-38-4. 
• 2004: We the People: A Call to Take Back America. Coreway Media, Inc.. ISBN 1-4000-5208-4. 
• 2004 (revised ed.): Unequal Protection. Rodale Books. ISBN 1-57954-955-1. 
• 2004 (revised ed. – first ed. 1998): The Prophet's Way. Park Street Press. ISBN 0-89281-198-6. 
• 2004 (revised ed. – first ed. 1997): Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight. Three Rivers Press. ISBN 1-4000-5157-6. 
• 2003: The Edison Gene. Park Street Press. ISBN 0-89281-128-5. 
• 2000: Thom Hartmann's Complete Guide to ADHD: Help for Your Family at Home, School and Work. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-52-0. 
• 2000: The Greatest Spiritual Secret of the Century. Hampton Roads. ISBN 1-57174-166-6. 
• 1998: Healing ADD. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-37-7. 
• 1996: Beyond ADD. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-12-1. 
• 1996: Think Fast!. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-08-3.  by Thom Hartmann and Jane Bowman, with Susan Burgess
• 1995: ADD Success Stories. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-03-2. 
• 1994: Focus Your Energy: Hunting for Success in Business. Pocket Books. ISBN 0-671-51689-2. 
• 1994: ADHD Secrets of Success: Coaching Yourself to Fulfillment in the Business World. Select Books. ISBN 1-59079-017-0. 
• 1992 (first edition): ADD: A Different Perception. Underwood Books. ISBN 1-887424-14-8. 

References[link]

External links[link]

• ThomHartmann.com Official site. Includes information on and streaming of the radio and TV shows, essays, chatroom, and a discussion board.
• Past episodes of The Big Picture on YouTube
• Various video clips at BigPicture.tv Hartmann speaking on various topics.
• Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class and What We Can Do About It, Hartmann talks about his book in a video at Fora TV.
• Thom Hartmann with the Dalai Lama Videos made during the filming of the documentary Dalai Lama Renaissance.
• "When Democracy Fails" Podcast on Google Video.
• C-SPAN Q&A interview with Hartmann, February 7, 2010