An investigator flashes victory signs upon the 2006 arrival of material gathered by the Stardust spacecraft at the Johnson Space Center in Texas.

The V sign is a hand gesture in which the index and middle fingers are raised and parted, while the other fingers are clenched. It has various meanings, depending on the cultural context and how it is presented. It is most commonly used to represent the letter V as in "victory", as a symbol of peace (usually with palm outward), as an offensive gesture (palm inward), and to represent the number two. It was adopted by the 1960s counterculture movement as a sign for peace.

Current usage[link]

Singer Robbie Williams using a V sign with palm facing signer as an insult.

Singer Rihanna using the V sign as a peace and friend sign.

2009 Iranian election protests

The sign's meaning depends in part on the way the hand is positioned. With the palm of the hand facing the signer (i.e. back of the hand facing the observer), it can mean:

• An insult – largely restricted to the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Ireland.^[1][2]
• Two – indicating quantity (even in countries where it can be an insult, provided the context is obvious) although this is more common with the palm turned around.

With the back of the hand facing the signer (palm of the hand facing the observer), it can mean:

• Two – a nonverbal communication of quantity.
• Victory – in a setting of wartime or competition. It was first popularised by Winston Churchill. It is sometimes made using both hands with upraised arms as US President Eisenhower, and in imitation of him, Richard Nixon, used to do.
• Peace or Friend – used around the world by peace and counter-culture groups; popularized in the American peace movement of the 1960s.
• Rabbit ears – used behind the head of another person, often the subject of a photograph. In some cultures this indicates a cuckold.
• The letter V, in American Sign Language – used when spelling.^[3]
• It is also used in tribute to the late rapper Tupac Shakur. ^{[4] [5]}

When used with other movement, it can mean:

• Air quotes – flexing fingers, palm out, both hands.^[6]
• This hand shape is also used in a number of signs, including "to see/look". When the pointer and middle fingers are pointed at the signer's eyes then turned and the pointer finger is pointed at someone it means "I am watching you." ^[7]
• The sign for the ordinal "second" in American Sign Language has the V-sign palm forward, then the hand turns (yaws) until the palm faces backward. ^[8]

V sign as an insult[link]

The insulting version of the gesture (with the palm inwards) is often compared to the offensive gesture known as "the finger". The "two-fingered salute", also known as "The Longbowman Salute", "the two" and as "The Tongs" in the West of Scotland and "the forks" in Australia,^[9] is commonly performed by flicking the V upwards from wrist or elbow. The V sign, when the palm is facing toward the person giving the sign, has long been an insulting gesture in England,^[10] and later in the rest of the United Kingdom; though the use of the inward peace sign as an insulting gesture is largely restricted to the UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand.^[1] It is frequently used to signify defiance (especially to authority), contempt, or derision.^[11]

As an example of the V sign (palm inward) as an insult, on November 1, 1990, The Sun, a British tabloid, ran an article on its front page with the headline "Up Yours, Delors" next to a large hand making a V sign protruding from a Union flag cuff. The Sun urged its readers to stick two fingers up at then President of the European Commission Jacques Delors, who had advocated an EU central government. The article attracted a number of complaints about its alleged racism, but the now defunct Press Council rejected the complaints after the editor of The Sun stated that the paper reserved the right to use vulgar abuse in the interests of Britain.^[12][13]

For a time in the UK, "a Harvey (Smith)" became a way of describing the insulting version of the V sign, much as "the word of Cambronne" is used in France, or "the Trudeau salute" is used to describe the one-fingered salute in Canada. This happened because, in 1971, show-jumper Harvey Smith was disqualified for making a televised V sign to the judges after winning the British Show Jumping Derby at Hickstead. (His win was reinstated two days later.)^[14]

Harvey Smith pleaded that he was using a Victory sign, a defence also used by other figures in the public eye.^[15] Sometimes foreigners visiting the countries mentioned above use the "two-fingered salute" without knowing it is offensive to the natives, for example when ordering two beers in a noisy pub, or in the case of the United States president George H. W. Bush, who, while touring Australia in 1992, attempted to give a "peace sign" to a group of farmers in Canberra—who were protesting about U.S. farm subsidies—and instead gave the insulting V sign.^[16]

Steve McQueen gives a British (knuckles outward) V sign in the closing scene of the 1970s motorsport movie, Le Mans. A still picture of the gesture was recorded by photographer Nigel Snowdon and has become an iconic image of both McQueen and the film.

Eric Young a TV news anchor in New Zealand was accidentally broadcast flashing the V sign to a producer off screen after a report on a Rugby match between Auckland and Counties Manukau.^[17][18]

Origins[link]

A widespread urban legend claims that two-fingered salute or V sign derives from a gesture made by longbowmen fighting in the English army at the Battle of Agincourt (1415) during the Hundred Years' War. According to the story, the French were in the habit of cutting off the arrow-shooting fingers of captured English and Welsh longbowmen, and the gesture was a sign of defiance on the part of the bowmen, showing the enemy that they still had their fingers,^[10][19][20] or, as a widespread pun puts it, that they could still "pluck yew". This story can be traced to the 1980s.^[21] The "pluck yew" pun seems to originate in 1996.^[22]

The first unambiguous evidence of the use of insulting V sign in England dates to 1901, when a worker outside Parkgate ironworks in Rotherham used the gesture (captured on the film) to indicate that he did not like being filmed.^[23] Peter Opie interviewed children in the 1950s and observed in The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren that the much older thumbing of the nose (cock-a-snook) had been replaced by the V sign as the most common insulting gesture used in the playground.^[15]

Desmond Morris discussed various possible origins of the V sign in Gestures: Their Origins and Distribution (published 1979), and came to no definite conclusion:

because of the strong taboo associated with the gesture (its public use has often been heavily penalised). As a result, there is a tendency to shy away from discussing it in detail. It is "known to be dirty" and is passed on from generation to generation by people who simply accept it as a recognised obscenity without bothering to analyse it... Several of the rival claims are equally appealing. The truth is that we will probably never know...

—Desmond Morris.^[15]

The V for Victory campaign and the victory/freedom sign[link]

V for victory on a Norwegian stamp of August 1941.

Winston Churchill waving the V sign.

During the German occupation of Jersey, a stonemason repairing the paving of the Royal Square incorporated a V for victory under the noses of the occupiers. This was later amended to refer to the Red Cross ship Vega. The addition of the date 1945 and a more recent frame has transformed it into a monument.

On January 14, 1941, Victor de Laveleye, former Belgian Minister of Justice and director of the Belgian French-speaking broadcasts on the BBC (1940–1944), suggested in a broadcast that Belgians use a V for victoire (French: “victory”) and vrijheid (Dutch: "freedom") as a rallying emblem during World War II. In the BBC broadcast, de Laveleye said that "the occupier, by seeing this sign, always the same, infinitely repeated, [would] understand that he is surrounded, encircled by an immense crowd of citizens eagerly awaiting his first moment of weakness, watching for his first failure." Indeed, within weeks chalked up Vs began appearing on walls throughout Belgium, the Netherlands, and northern France.^[24]

Buoyed by this success, the BBC set out a plan, the "V for Victory" campaign, for which they put in charge the assistant news editor Douglas Ritchie posing as “Colonel Britton”. Ritchie suggested an audible V using its Morse code rhythm (three dots and a dash). Having the same rhythm, the opening bars of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony was then used as the call-sign by the BBC in its foreign language programmes to occupied Europe for the rest of the war. The irony that they were composed by a German was not lost on many of the audience or for the more musically educated that it was "Fate knocking on the door" of the Third Reich. ( Listen to this call-sign. (help·info)).^[24][25] The BBC also encouraged the use of the V gesture introduced by de Laveleye.^[26]

By July 1941, the emblematic use of the letter V had spread through occupied Europe, and on July 19, Winston Churchill put the British government’s stamp of approval on the V for Victory campaign in a speech,^[27] from which point he started using the V hand sign. Early on he used palm in (sometimes with a cigar between the fingers).^[28] Later in the war he used palm out.^[29] It is claimed that the aristocratic Churchill made the change after it was explained to him what it signified to the other classes in Britain.^[15][30] Other allied leaders used the sign as well; since 1942, Charles de Gaulle used the V sign in every speech until 1969.^[31]

British Occultist Aleister Crowley claimed to have invented the usage of a V-sign as a magical foil to the Nazis' use of the Swastika in February 1941. He maintained that he passed this to friends at the BBC, and to the British Naval Intelligence Division through his connections in MI5, eventually gaining the approval of Winston Churchill. Crowley pointed out that in his 1913 publication Magick a V-sign and a swastika appear on the same plate.^[32]

Vietnam War, victory and peace[link]

Nixon departing the White House on 9 August 1974

U.S. President Richard Nixon used it to signal victory, an act which became one of his best-known trademarks. He also used it on his departure from public office following his resignation in 1974.

A similar sign was used in protests against the Vietnam War (and subsequent anti-war protests) and by the counterculture as a sign of peace. Because the hippies of the day often flashed this sign (palm out) while saying "Peace", it became popularly known (through association) as the peace sign.^[33]

V sign in photographs of Japanese[link]

Young Japanese women giving V gesture in Tokyo (2006)

The palm-outwards V sign is very commonly made by Japanese people, especially younger people, when posing for informal photographs. One account of this practice claims that during the 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo, Hokkaidō, American figure skater Janet Lynn stumbled into Japanese pop culture when she fell during a free-skate period, but continued to smile even as she sat on the ice. Though she placed only third in the competition, her cheerful diligence and persistence resonated with many Japanese viewers, making her an overnight foreign celebrity in Japan. Lynn, a peace activist, was repeatedly seen flashing the V sign in the Japanese media thereafter. Though the V sign was known of in Japan before Lynn used it there (from the post-World War II Allied occupation of Japan), she is credited by some Japanese for having popularized its use in amateur photographs.^[33]

V sign in Korea[link]

In South Korea, the V sign is the most popular pose in photographs. It is used in both casual and formal settings.^[34][35] It is not widely known to Koreans that the V sign can mean "peace" or used as an insult; some may believe that the meaning of the sign is "victory". They use it both ways (palm facing the signer and palm facing forward).

Other uses[link]

• In Argentina, the V sign, besides "victory", is linked to a political movement, the Peronismo.
• Villanova University students, alumni, and fans "throw their Vs up" in tradition and as a sign of pride of their university and athletic teams.
• V sign, especially when printed in green, is a sign of the Iranian Green Movement.
• After the first elections in Iraq after the U.S. Invasion, a well known photo was circulated of a woman showing the V sign with one of her fingers dipped in purple ink. The ink is used to identify individuals who have already voted.
• In Poland during the Solidarity movement, protesters showed the V sign meaning they would defeat Communism.^[36] After partially free elections, when Tadeusz Mazowiecki was chosen as prime minister (August 24, 1989), he went to the MPs with the V sign, which was transmitted on TV.^[37] It is sometimes shown during debates about the fall of Communism.
• In Romania the sign represents victory and has been used as an extension of the roman salute to announce that victory has been achieved. It was used heavily during the Romanian revolution after the ousting of Nicolae Ceausescu. Mircea Dinescu is appearing in the first transmission of the Romanian Television after the revolutionaries occupied it shouting "We won!" and flashing the victory sign.
• During the Yugoslav Wars, Croatian and Bosnian troops and paramilitary militia used the sign as a greeting or an informal salute. U.S. and NATO peacekeepers stationed in Bosnia were forbidden to use the V-sign (peace symbol) to avoid upsetting or offending Serbs they might encounter.^[38]
• In Vietnam, the V sign means "hello" since the Vietnamese word for the number "2" sounds like the English pronunciation of the greeting "hi".
• In the TV miniseries V, the symbol is frequently used by the resistance to signify victory against the visitors.

Footnotes[link]

References[link]

• Desmond Morris with Peter Collett, Peter Marsh and Marie O'Shaughnessy. Gestures: Their Origins and Distribution. London: Jonathan Cape, 1979. ISBN 0-224-01570-2; NY: Stein and Day, ISBN 0-8128-2607-8
• Armstrong, Nancy; Wagner, Melissa (2003). "The 'V'". Field Guide to Gestures: How to Identify and Interpret Virtually Every Gesture Known to Man. Philadelphia: Quirk Books. pp. 227–30. ISBN 978-1-931686-20-4. http://books.google.com/books?id=LvbKr1qMr_AC&pg=PA227. 
• Lefevre, Romana (2011). "V". Rude Hand Gestures of the World: A Guide to Offending Without Words. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. pp. 122–3. ISBN 978-0-8118-7807-4. http://books.google.com/books?id=tvgshSm7H9EC&pg=PA122. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: V-sign

• Photos of the V sign:
  • Churchill Outside no. 10
  • Churchill Victory Sign
  • Nixon departing office
  • Paavo Väyrynen after Finnish Centre party named him foreign trade and development minister
  • Need4Peace

• The V sign in the news:
  • Guardian 6 June 2002: In pictures the V sign
  • Sky News 18 June 2004: OAP fined £100 for V sign
  • BBC 3 April 2009: Scottish footballers dropped for V sign
• Urban Legends Reference Pages: pluck yew

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2008)

This biohazard sign is a completely conventional symbol with no inherent relationship to what it represents.

A sign is a representation of an object that implies a connection between itself and its object. A natural sign bears a causal relation to its object—for instance, thunder is a sign of storm. A conventional sign signifies by agreement, as a full stop signifies the end of a sentence. (This is in contrast to a symbol which stands for another thing, as a flag may be a symbol of a nation).

Door sign

The way a sign signifies is called semiosis which is a topic of semiotics and philosophy of language.

How a sign is perceived depends upon what is intended or expressed in the semiotic relationship of:

• Signification
• Significance (i.e. meaning)
• Importance

Thus, for example, people may speak of the significance of events, the signification of characters, the meaning of sentences, or the import of a communication. Different ways of relating signs to their objects are called modes of signification.

Uses of conventional signs are varied. Usually the goal is to elicit a response or simply inform. That can be achieved by marking something, displaying a message (i.e. a notice), drawing attention or presenting evidence of an underlying cause (for instance, medical symptoms signify a disease), performing a bodily gesture, etc.

Nature[link]

Semiotics, epistemology, logic, and philosophy of language are concerned about the nature of signs, what they are and how they signify. The nature of signs and symbols and significations, their definition, elements, and types, is mainly established by Aristotle, Augustine, and Aquinas. According to these classic sources, significance is a relationship between two sorts of things: signs and the kinds of things they signify (intend, express or mean), where one term necessarily causes something else to come to the mind. Distinguishing natural signs and conventional signs, the traditional theory of signs^[who?] sets the following threefold partition of things:

1. There are things that are just things, not any sign at all;
2. There are things that are also signs of other things (as natural signs of the physical world and mental signs of the mind);
3. There are things that are always signs, as languages (natural and artificial) and other cultural nonverbal symbols, as documents, money, ceremonies, and rites.

Pedestrian crossing sign

Thus there are things which may act as signs without any respect to the human agent (the things of the external world, all sorts of indications, evidences, symptoms, and physical signals), there are signs which are always signs (the entities of the mind as ideas and images, thoughts and feelings, constructs and intentions); and there are signs that have to get their signification (as linguistic entities and cultural symbols). So, while natural signs serve as the source of signification, the human mind is the agency through which signs signify naturally occurring things, such as objects, states, qualities, quantities, events, processes, or relationships. Human language and discourse, communication, philosophy, science, logic, mathematics, poetry, theology, and religion are only some of fields of human study and activity where grasping the nature of signs and symbols and patterns of signification may have a decisive value.

Types[link]

A sign can denote any of the following:

The western zodiac signs

A signboard on a beach in Durban in apartheid-era South Africa indicates a racially segregated beach.

• Sign, in astrology: often used to mean the Sun sign
• Sign or signing, in communication: communicating via hand gestures, such as in sign language.
• Gang signal
• Sign, in Tracking (hunting): also known as Spoor (animal); trace evidence left on the ground after passage.
• A signboard.
• A sign, in common use, is an indication that a previously observed event is about to occur again
• Sign, in divination and religion: an omen, an event or occurrence believed to foretell the future
• Sign, in ontology and spirituality: a coincidence; see synchronicity
• Sign (linguistics): a combination of a concept and a sound-image described by Ferdinand de Saussure
• In mathematics, the sign of a number tells whether it is positive or negative. Also, the sign of a permutation tells whether it is the product of an even or odd number of transpositions.
• Signedness, in computing, is the property that a representation of a number has one bit, the sign bit, which denotes whether the number is non-negative or negative. A number is called signed if it contains a sign bit, otherwise unsigned. See also signed number representation
• Sign, in biology: an indication of some living thing's presence
• Medical sign, in medicine: objective evidence of the presence of a disease or disorder, as opposed to a symptom, which is subjective
• Sign (semiotics): the basic unit of meaning
• Information sign: a notice that instructs, advises, informs or warns people
• Traffic sign: a sign that instructs drivers; see also stop sign, speed limit sign, cross walk sign
• Sign, in a writing system: a basic unit. Similar terms which are more specific are character, letter or grapheme
• Commercial signage, including flashing signs, such as on a retail store, factory, or theatre
• Signature, in history: a handwritten depiction observed on a document to show authorship and will

See also[link]

References[link]

Look up sign in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Joshua "Josh" Turnbull (born 12 March 1988) is a Wales international rugby union player, who currently plays as a flanker for the Scarlets in the RaboDirect Pro12 and Llanelli RFC in the Principality Premiership.

Turnbull has represented Wales at U18, U19 and U20 levels; he has participated in the last two IRB U19 World Championships, scoring a try against Scotland in 2006 and representing his country in all five of Wales' games in the 2006–07 season, including the Division A semi-final against New Zealand. He was in the Wales U20 squad for the 2008 Under-20 Six Nations.

In January 2011 he was named the Wales national rugby union team squad for the 2011 Six Nations Championship^[1] and made his international debut 12 February 2011 in the 24-6 win against Scotland as a second-half replacement.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Scarlets profile
• Wales profile

This Welsh rugby union biography is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Gary Clark Jr.
Background information
Born	(1984-02-15) February 15, 1984 (age 28)
Origin	Austin, Texas, United States
Genres	Rock, Hard Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Soul, R&B, Blues
Years active	1996–present
Labels	Hotwire Unlimited
Website	www.garyclarkjr.com
Members
Gary Clark Jr. Johnny Bradley-Bass Zapata!-Guitar J.J. Johnson-Drums Chris Layton-Drums Johnny Radelat-Drums

Gary Clark Jr. live

Gary Clark Jr. (born February 15, 1984) is an American guitarist and actor based in Austin, Texas.^[1][2][3][4] Acclaimed as the savior of blues,^[5][6] Clark has established a resume which has enabled him to share the stage with various legends of rock and roll.^[7] His live performances, as well as his recordings, blend rock, soul and blues, infusing fluid guitar with a guttural howl and a falsetto trill that mix together. Despite his roots, Clark comes across as someone who is forging something unique in the music world.^[8] More specifically, his 2010 self-titled EP debuts his ability to explore various genres of music, while demonstrating his independence and distinctiveness from the heavily saturated music industry.^[8][9]

Musical career[link]

Gary Clark Jr. began playing guitar at the age of twelve. Born and raised in Austin, Clark played small gigs throughout his teens, until he met promoter Clifford Antone, proprietor of the Austin music club Antone's. Antone's provided the launching pad for Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimmie Vaughan to redefine modern rock music.^[5] Soon after meeting Clifford, Clark began to play with an array of musical icons, including Jimmie Vaughan. Vaughan and others in the Austin music community helped Clark along his musical path, facilitating his ascent in the Texas rock & roll scene.^[10] Today, Clark is one of the many black musicians in rock & roll who are resurrecting the blues of today, while in contrast to the past forty years, where blues has been the canvas and playground for mainly white musicians. Clark's music, highlights how the influence of rock and roll and blues music have ubiquitously shaped virtually every medium of music over the past century, ranging from hip-hop to country music.^[5]

Clark was featured in the 2010 Crossroads Guitar Festival alongside B.B. King, Eric Clapton, Buddy Guy, Steve Winwood, John Mayer, Sheryl Crow, Jeff Beck, and ZZ Top.^[11][12][13] He joined Doyle Bramhall II and Sheryl Crow on stage for their performance with Eric Clapton, while also debuting his recent material.^[14][15]

In June 2011, Clark played at the annual Bonnaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tennessee.^[16] at the Miller Lite On Tap Lounge.

Rolling Stone declared Clark "Best Young Gun" in its April 2011, "Best of Rock" issue.^[17]

Clark sang on the bonus track cover of "I Want You Back" by the Jackson 5 on Sheryl Crow 's album 100 Miles from Memphis.^[18][19]

In February 2012, Clark performed along side blues legends in the Red, White, and Blues event at the White House. The event, aired on PBS, also included B.B. King, Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, Buddy Guy, among others. Clark soloed "Catfish Blues" and "In the Evening (When the Sun Goes Down)," and contributed to performances of "Let the Good Times Roll," "Beat Up Old Guitar," "Five Long Years," and "Sweet Home Chicago".^[20][21][22]

Film[link]

Clark starred alongside Danny Glover, Stacy Keach, and Charles Dutton in John Sayles' 2007 film, Honeydripper.^[23][24]

Awards and recognitions[link]

Mayor of Austin, Kirk Watson, proclaimed May 3, 2001 Gary Clark Jr. Day. Clark was seventeen years old at the time.^[25][26][27] Clark won the Austin Music Award for Best Blues and Electric Guitarist, on three different occasions.^[28]

Clark was SPIN magazine's breakout artist for the month of November 2011.^[29]

Rolling Stone magazine ranked Clark's Bright Lights EP number 40 on its list of its top 50 albums of 2011.^[30]

Instruments[link]

He uses the Epiphone Casino electric guitars and Epiphone acoustic guitars.^[31][32][33]

Charity[link]

Clark performed alongside Alicia Keys' Keep a Child Alive Black Ball benefit, in an effort to raise money for children with AIDS in Africa.^[34] The two performed the Beatles' "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" as a tribute to George Harrison.^[35]

Discography[link]

• 2004(?) - 110
• 2008 - Worry No More - Hotwire Unlimited
• 2010 - Gary Clark Jr. EP - Hotwire Unlimited
• 2011 - The Bright Lights EP
• 2012 - Gary Clark Jr. Presents HWUL Raw Cuts Vol. 1

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Clark's MySpace page
• Crossroadsguitarfestival.com
• Review

Gary C. Clark (born May 1, 1962) is a former professional American football wide receiver in the National Football League who played for the Washington Redskins (1985–1992), Phoenix Cardinals (1993–1994) and Miami Dolphins (1995).

Early life[link]

Clark attended and played high school football at Pulaski County High School in Dublin, Virginia.

College career[link]

Clark played college football at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia, where he caught 155 passes for 2,863 yards and 16 touchdowns. He also had three punt returns for touchdowns, including 89- and 87-yard returns in a game during the 1983 season against the University of Virginia. Clark was at James Madison during the Dukes' first four Division I-AA seasons. He caught 46 passes for James Madison's 8-3 team in 1982 and had 57 receptions in 1983. He was the Virginia offensive player of the year in 1982 and an honorable mention All-American in 1982 and 1983.

Clark became the first person in James Madison history to have his jersey retired.

Professional career[link]

USFL[link]

After college, Clark played for the Jacksonville Bulls of the United States Football League after being picked in the United States Football League draft. He played for the Bulls in 1984 and 1985.

NFL[link]

Clark was selected by the Washington Redskins in the second round of the 1984 NFL Supplemental Draft of USFL and CFL Players.

In 1985, he signed with the Redskins and had a superb rookie season, recording 72 receptions for 926 yards and five touchdowns. Clark quickly established himself as one of the top receivers in the NFL. He followed up his superb rookie season in 1986 with a Pro Bowl year catching 74 passes for 1,265 yards and seven touchdowns. Clark set a Redskin record for receiving yards in a game during a Monday Night Football contest with the New York Giants. He caught 11 passes for 241 yards and a touchdown. The record still stands today as the "most receiving yards in a non-strike game" (Anthony Allen surpassed Clark's tally during the 1987 strike season). The Redskins went on to finish 12-4 and defeated the reigning Super Bowl champion Chicago Bears, 27-13, in a divisional playoff game but lost to the Giants in the NFC Championship game, 17-0.

In 1987, Clark again had a Pro Bowl year, catching 56 passes for 1,066 and seven touchdowns. He achieved these numbers in only 11 games, as a player strike shortened the season by one game and replacements played three games. No Redskin player crossed the picket line and the replacements went 3-0. Clark was only one of four NFL receivers to surpass 1,000 yards. By this time, he had caught the eye of CBS commentator John Madden. Clark's toughness, big-play ability and willingness to block made him a regular on the All Madden Team during his playing career. The Redskins went on to finish 11-4, winning the NFC East crown. In the playoffs, the Redskins defeated the Chicago Bears in the Divisional Playoff game for the second year in a row, 21-17. Clark caught three passes for 57 yards and a touchdown in the NFC Championship game against the Minnesota Vikings. The Redskins won, 17-10, to earn the right to play in Super Bowl XXII. Clark caught three passes for 55 yards and a touchdown, while also rushing for 25 yards in Washington's 42-10 rout of John Elway and the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXII.

Clark's numbers dropped in 1988 as he caught 59 passes for 892 yards and seven touchdowns. The Redskins finished a paltry 7-9 and missed the playoffs. He returned to form in 1989, catching 79 passes (a career high) for 1,229 yards and nine touchdowns. The Redskins finished 10-6 but missed the playoffs again because of a 5-6 start. Clark, along with fellow receivers Art Monk and Ricky Sanders, surpassed the 1,000 yard mark in 1989. This was the first time in NFL History that three receivers from one team all went over the 1,000 yard mark in the same year.

In 1990, Clark had another Pro Bowl year and the Redskins made the playoffs. He caught 75 passes for 1,112 yards and eight touchdowns. The Redskins went on to beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 20-6, in an NFC Wild Card game. Clark caught four passes for 63 yards and a touchdown. The Redskins lost the next week to the San Francisco 49ers, 28-10.

In 1991, Clark and the Redskins tore through the NFL. He caught 70 passes for 1,340 yards and ten touchdowns. His 19.1 yards per catch was second in the NFL. Clark caught four passes for 203 yards and three touchdowns in Washington's 56-17 rout of the Atlanta Falcons in week 11. The Redskins finished 14-2, won the NFC East, and claimed home field advantage throughout the playoffs. Washington beat Atlanta, 24-7, and crushed Detroit, 41-10, to earn a berth in Super Bowl XXVI against the Buffalo Bills. Clark had a big day with seven catches for 114 yards and a touchdown in Washington's 37-24 defeat of the Bills. The Redskins led 24-0 early in the third quarter, but Buffalo cut the lead to 24-10. His 30-yard touchdown reception in the third quarter was instrumental in thwarting a comeback attempt by the Bills.

Clark, Monk and Sanders gave the Redskins one of the best receiving corps in the NFL during the late 1980s and early 1990s. They were known as The Posse. Clark was long known as the most fiery spirit of the bunch, and he was known to run laps around RFK Stadium after touchdowns and during Redskins comebacks. Clark signed with the Phoenix Cardinals as a free agent prior to the 1993 season, and the Redskins have only made the playoffs three times since.

Clark retired from the NFL after the 1995 season. In his 11 NFL seasons, he caught 699 passes for 10,856 yards and 65 touchdowns, while rushing for 54 yards and gaining 62 yards on nine punt returns. He also had twenty-seven 100-yard games wearing the Redskins uniform. Clark was a four-time Pro Bowl selection in 1986, 1987, 1990, and 1991. He was also a three-time All-Pro selection. He led his team in receiving seven times (1986, 1987, 1989–1992, 1994), and won two Super Bowls, Super Bowl XXII and Super Bowl XXVI, during his NFL career.

Clark was the first receiver in NFL history to catch at least 50 passes in his first ten NFL seasons. As of 2009, the only other players to do so have been Marvin Harrison and Torry Holt.

Notes[link]

Clark was the owner of the now closed South Beach Restaurant and Martini Lounge in Bethesda, Maryland.

He was inducted into the Redskins Ring of Honor on October 7, 2007 and concluded his speech with, "We are going to spank Detroit's butt." The Redskins won the game, 34-3.

In 2007, he was inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame.

External links[link]

• Clark's statistics
• More Career Stats
• Gary Clark Biography
• JMU Athletic Hall of Fame