The Masked Rider

The Masked Rider is the primary mascot of Texas Tech University. It is the oldest of the university's mascots still in existence today. Originally called "Ghost Rider", it was an unofficial mascot appearing in a few games in 1936 and then became the official mascot with the 1954 Gator Bowl. The Masked Rider has led the team onto the field at nearly every football game since. It is the nation's first school mascot to feature a live horse at a football game, ahead of Florida State's Chief Osceola and Renegade and 25 years before USC's Traveler and all other such mascots in existence today.

In fact, after learning of the Masked Rider, other schools emulated the idea of a mounted mascot. Florida State began their tradition in 1978, immediately after seeing Texas Tech's live mascot at the 1977 Tangerine Bowl that pitted the two. The Oklahoma State Cowboys copied the Masked Rider in 1984 when Eddy Finley, a Texas Tech alumnus became an Oklahoma State University agricultural education professor, and started the Spirit Rider Program when both schools were still in separate conferences.

The Masked Rider (film)

The Masked Rider is a 1919 American drama western film serial directed by Aubrey M. Kennedy. Scenes were filmed in Texas and Mexico. The serial was considered to be lost in entirety. However, most episodes have been found, although many are incomplete. "The Masked Rider" is considered to be the first film serial about a masked cowboy. The 15-episode serial is also significant for being the earliest surviving film appearance of actor Boris Karloff.

Cast

See also

West Africa

West Africa, also called Western Africa and the West of Africa, is the westernmost subcontinent of Africa. West Africa has been defined as including the 18 countries Benin, Burkina Faso, the island of Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, the island of Saint Helena, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Sao Tome and Principe and Togo.

History

The history of West Africa can be divided into five major periods: first, its prehistory, in which the first human settlers arrived, developed agriculture, and made contact with peoples to the north; the second, the Iron Age empires that consolidated both intra-African, and extra-African trade, and developed centralized states; third, Major polities flourished, which would undergo an extensive history of contact with non-Africans; fourth, the colonial period, in which Great Britain and France controlled nearly the whole of the region; fifth, the post-independence era, in which the current nations were formed.

West Africa (magazine)

West Africa (1917-2005) was a weekly news magazine that was published in London for over 80 years and closed in 2005.

History

It was first published on 3 February 1917 from offices in Fleet Street, with the commercial backing of Elder Dempster Shipping Line and the trading company John Holt. It was to appear weekly, at a price of sixpence per copy. Its first editorial explained its raison d'etre:

The magazine was intended as "an open forum for the discussion of every question involving the welfare of the peoples of West Africa.... It offers itself as a friend to every cause which holds out a prospect of advancing the position of West Africa as a prosperous and contented member of the Empire...".

Having begun as a source of news about events and issues in the British colonies of West Africa as well as a link between the colonial power and its administrators in the field, for 80 years West Africa magazine was considered a major source of information about the region.

In the mid-1960s is was the target of a successful takeover bid by Cecil Harmsworth King’s media empire. In 1978 it began to publish poetry and fiction by some of the continent's leading writers. The literary editor from 1978 was Robert Fraser, followed in 1981 by the Booker Prize–winning novelist Ben Okri. In 1993 a commemorative volume was published, entitled West Africa Over 75 Years: Selections from the Raw Material of History, edited by the magazine's then editor, Kaye Whiteman (1936-2014), and researched by Kole Omotoso, Ferdinand Dennis and Alfred Zack-Williams.

West Africa (album)

West Africa is an album by saxophonist Willis Jackson which was recorded in 1973 and first released on the Muse label.

Reception

Allmusic rated the album with 3 stars.

Track listing

All compositions by Willis Jackson except as indicated

Personnel

References

The Masked Rider: Cycling in West Africa

The Masked Rider: Cycling in West Africa (ISBN 1550226673) is a 1996 non-fiction book written by Rush drummer Neil Peart about his bicycling travel through Cameroon.

Synopsis

In November 1988, Peart joined David Mozer's Bicycle Africa for a month-long tour of Cameroon. Along with David, Neil would travel with three other strangers. Leonard; an African-American electrical engineer who is also a Vietnam vet. Elsa; a slender 60-year-old pacifist who would struggle to keep up with everyone and complain about everything. And Annie; a 30-something administrative assistant who was often scatterbrained.

Peart, an avid reader, brought two books on the trip with him, Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle and Dear Theo by Vincent van Gogh, to read at rest stops and before bedtime. He would entwine thoughts about these two books throughout The Masked Rider.

Southern tour

They all met in Douala, where they would first travel west along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and then turn north to the heart of the former British Cameroon, stopping at many towns in Southern Cameroon along the way, like Tiko, Buea, Limbe, Kumba, Nkongsamba, Bafang, Bafoussam, Mbouda, Bamenda, Bafut, Ndop, Kumbo, Jakiri, and Foumban.