Wisconsin

Camp Randall Stadium is an outdoor stadium in Madison, Wisconsin. It has been the home of the Wisconsin Badgers football team in rudimentary form... since 1895, and as a complete stadium since 1917. It is located in the south-central region of the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus. The stadium seats 80,321. It is the oldest and fifth largest stadium in the Big Ten Conference, and the 41st largest stadium in the world. The stadium received its name because it lies on the grounds of Camp Randall, a former Union Army training camp during the Civil War. The camp was named after then Governor Alexander Randall, who later became Postmaster General of the United States. After an outcry from veterans over plans to turn the site into building lots, the state bought it in 1893 and presented it to the university. Soon afterward, it was pressed into service as an athletic ground. It was originally used by the track and field team before the football and baseball teams moved there in 1895. However, the wooden bleachers were very difficult to maintain, and a portion of them were actually condemned as unsafe in 1914.
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The Kohl Center is an arena and athletic center at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States. The building, which opened in 1998, is... the home of the university's men's and women's basketball and ice hockey teams. Seating capacity is variable, as the center can be rearranged to accommodate a basketball court, a hockey rink, or a concert. The maximum capacity is 17,230 in its basketball configuration, and 15,325 for ice hockey. The center has three levels, with the floor holding about 7,500 people, and the two upper balconies about 4,500 each. It is the third largest indoor venue in Wisconsin and the largest outside Milwaukee. The arena is located on the southeast corner of the UW–Madison campus, at the intersection of West Dayton and North Frances Streets. The sporting arena is named after United States Senator Herb Kohl, who donated $25 million of his Kohl's grocery and department store fortune to the building project. It is the largest single donation in University of Wisconsin System history.
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East Towne Mall is a shopping mall located on the northeast side of Madison, Wisconsin. The mall opened for business October 14, 1971 with a small... ribbon cutting ceremony, a year after West Towne Mall, on the west side of Madison. At the time it was constructed, East Towne was Madison's largest enclosed mall, and had four large anchor stores, Sears, J. C. Penney, H.C. Prange Co., and Gimbel's. Prange Way also took up a large section at the back of Pranges' space. The mall was developed by Jacobs, Visconsi, and Jacobs Company of Cleveland, Ohio. Construction began September 18, 1970. Originally, the mall contained eight water pools and sunken lounge areas. Artists Clarence Van Duzer and Joseph McDonnell were commissioned to create art work for the mall. McDonnell created four sculptures, including a 3,000 pound metal yellow rhinoceros with red polka dots made of half-inch steel plates. Another was a 35'x22' chandelier-like work suspended above one of the entryways. The chandelier was multi-colored and according to McDonnell, was inspired by a game of pick-up sticks and designed to resemble "a galaxy of light" from outside the center.
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The Alliant Energy Center of Dane County is a multi-building complex in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. It comprises 164 acres of greenspace and... includes the 255,000-square-foot Exhibition Hall, the 10,000 seat Veterans Memorial Coliseum, the 29-acre Willow Island, the 22,000-square-foot Arena, and nine modern agricultural exhibit buildings. The Center welcomes more than one million people attending more than 500 events annually, ranging from local meetings and banquets to large sporting events and major concerts. The Alliant Energy Center campus is located on the southern edge of Madison, Wisconsin, on John Nolen Drive. In 1895 the Agricultural Society and Dane County purchased 250 acres of land at the current site to provide an area that could be used for the Dane County Fair. This area was known as "Lakeside Park Farm", but some thought it merely represented a worthless swampland. Because of financial difficulties, the Dane County Fair was halted on the site in 1938 and did not return until 1951.
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Harry Houdini was a Hungarian-born American stunt performer, noted for his sensational escape acts. He first attracted notice as Handcuff Harry, on a tour of Europe, where he would sensationally challenge different police-forces to try to keep him locked up. This revealed a talent for gimmickry... and for audience involvement that would characterise all his work. Soon he was extending his repertoire to include chains, ropes slung from skyscrapers, straitjackets under water, and having to hold his breath inside a sealed milk-can. In 1904, thousands watched as he tried to escape from a special handcuff commissioned by London's Daily Mirror, keeping them in suspense for an hour. Another stunt saw him buried alive and only just able to claw himself to the surface, emerging in a state of near-breakdown. While many suspected that these escapes were fabricated, it is ironic that Houdini was meanwhile presenting himself as the scourge of fake magicians and spiritualists.
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Thomas Edward "Tom" Hulce is an American actor and theater producer. As an actor, he is perhaps best known for his Oscar-nominated portrayal of Mozart in the movie Amadeus and his role as "Pinto" in National Lampoon's Animal House. Additional acting awards included a total of four Golden Globe... nominations, an Emmy Award, and a Tony Award nomination. Hulce retired from acting in the mid-1990s in order to focus upon stage directing and producing. In 2007, he won a Tony Award as a lead producer of the Broadway musical Spring Awakening. Hulce was born in Detroit, Michigan . The youngest of four children, he was raised in Plymouth, Michigan. His mother, Joanna , sang briefly with Phil Spitalny's All-Girl Orchestra, and his father, Raymond Albert Hulce, worked for the Ford Motor Company. Although he originally wanted to be a singer as a child, he switched to acting after his voice changed during his teenage years. He left home at the age of 15 and attended Interlochen Arts Academy and the North Carolina School of the Arts.
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Virginia Cathryn "Gena" Rowlands is an American actress of film, stage and television. The four-time Emmy and two-time Golden Globe winner is best known for her collaborations with her actor-director husband John Cassavetes in ten films, in two of which, Gloria and A Woman Under the Influence, she... gave Academy Award-nominated performances. Rowlands was born as Virginia Cathryn Rowlands in Madison, Wisconsin. Her mother, Mary Allen , was a painter and housewife originally from Arkansas. Her father, Edwin Myrwyn Rowlands, was a banker and a state legislator who was of Welsh descent. Her family moved to Washington, D.C. in 1939 when Edwin was appointed to a position in the United States Department of Agriculture; moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1942 when he was appointed as branch manager of the Office of Price Administration; and later moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota. From 1947-50, she attended the University of Wisconsin, where she was a popular student already renowned for her beauty. She left for New York City to study drama at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.
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Ronald Lawrence Kovic is an anti-war activist, veteran and writer who was paralyzed in the Vietnam War. He is best known as the author of the memoir Born on the Fourth of July, which was made into an Academy Award–winning movie directed by Oliver Stone, with Tom Cruise playing Kovic. Kovic... received the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay on January 20, 1990, exactly 22 years to the day that he was wounded in Vietnam. Ron Kovic was also nominated for an Academy Award for best screen play. Bruce Springsteen wrote the song "Shut Out The Light" after reading Kovic's memoir and then meeting him. Tom Paxton, the folk singer/political activist, wrote the song "Born on the Fourth of July", which is on his "New Songs from the Briarpatch" album. Academy Award winning actress Jane Fonda has stated that Ron Kovic's story was the inspiration for her film Coming Home. Kovic was born in Ladysmith, Wisconsin, and was raised in Massapequa, New York, in a Roman Catholic household. Inspired by President John F.
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Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway... people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New France. After the Louisiana Purchase, settlers laid the foundation for an agriculture-based economy in the heart of the Corn Belt. Iowa is often known as the "Food Capital of the World". In the latter half of the 20th century, Iowa's agricultural economy transitioned to a diversified economy of advanced manufacturing, processing, financial services, biotechnology, and green energy production. Iowa is the 26th most extensive and the 30th most populous of the 50 United States. Its capital and largest city is Des Moines. Iowa has been listed as one of the safest states to live in. Iowa is bordered by the Mississippi River on the east; the Missouri River and the Big Sioux River on the west; the northern boundary is a line along 43 degrees, 30 minutes north latitude.
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Illinois is the 25th most extensive and the 5th most populous of the 50 United States, and is often noted as a microcosm of the entire country. With... Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal, timber, and petroleum in the south, Illinois has a broad economic base. Illinois is a major transportation hub. The Port of Chicago connects the state to other global ports from the Great Lakes, via the Saint Lawrence Seaway, to the Atlantic Ocean; as well as the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River, via the Illinois River. For decades, O'Hare International Airport has ranked as one of the world's busiest airports. Illinois has long had a reputation as a bellwether both in social and cultural terms and politics. In the 1810s, settlers began arriving from Kentucky. In 1818, Illinois achieved statehood. The state's population originally grew from south to north. Chicago was founded in the 1830s on the banks of the Chicago River, one of the few natural harbors on southern Lake Michigan.
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Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word... mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake". Michigan is the 8th most populous of the 50 United States, with the 11th most extensive total area. Its capital is Lansing, and the largest city is Detroit. Michigan has the longest freshwater coastline of any political subdivision in the world, being bounded by four of the five Great Lakes, plus Lake Saint Clair. Michigan is one of the leading U.S. states for recreational boating. The state has 64,980 inland lakes and ponds. A person in the state is never more than six miles from a natural water source or more than 85 miles from a Great Lakes shoreline. It is the largest state by total area east of the Mississippi River. Michigan is the only state to consist of two peninsulas. The Lower Peninsula, to which the name Michigan was originally applied, is often noted to be shaped like a mitten.
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