Milton Friedman Saw Free Markets as a Tool for 'Human Freedom'

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The influential economist changed how policymakers looked at money. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Economics Report.

Milton Friedman in 1977, a year after he won the Nobel Prize in economic sciences

Economists rarely shape policy to the extent that Milton Friedman did.

He died on November sixteenth in San Francisco, California, at the age of ninety-four.

Milton Friedman is best known for his work on the idea that governments can slow inflation by shrinking the money supply. He expanded on this theory, known as monetarism, by studying years of American monetary policy.

He argued against the advice of John Maynard Keynes. The British economist was a major influence from the nineteen thirties to the sixties. His answer to recession and high unemployment was government spending on public works, and printing more money to pay for it.

This increase in the money supply fed inflation. But policymakers at that time generally accepted that job growth meant high inflation rates.

Milton Friedman showed that inflation hurt job growth. He argued that governments should control the money supply to keep prices from rising, or falling, too much. But he thought they should not intervene in markets or job creation.

His ideas in the nineteen fifties and sixties were not popular at the time. But in the early seventies the United States had both high inflation and high unemployment. Policymakers started to listen. He won a Nobel Prize in economics in nineteen seventy-six.

His advice to cut taxes and control inflation influenced the policies of President Ronald Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He brought his ideas to the public by writing for magazines like Newsweek and appearing on television.

But some critics blame his strong support of tax cuts for increased budget deficits in the United States. And he was criticized for dealing with the military government of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. That government overthrew a democratically elected president in nineteen seventy-three. But, as Milton Friedman noted, it was also willing to make economic reforms.

Today, changes in financial markets have made it much harder to control money supplies the way he advised. But his belief in small government and free markets is still popular with economic conservatives and libertarians.

He believed deeply in individual choice. Last year, he told public television's Charlie Rose that he wanted to be remembered as someone who helped increase human freedom.

Survivors include his wife, Rose, an economist with whom he wrote many of his books.

And that's the VOA Special English Economics Report, written by Mario Ritter. I'm Bob Doughty.

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Nellie McKay's 'Pretty Little Head' | A Question From Vietnam About Murphy's Law | A Visit to the National Museum of the Marine Corps

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HOST:

Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC in VOA Special English.

(MUSIC)

I'm Doug Johnson. On our show this week:

We answer a question about a popular American expression …

Play some music from Nellie McKay ...

And report about a new museum near Washington, D.C.

Marine Museum

Last month, a new museum opened in Triangle, Virginia, near Washington, D.C. The National Museum of the Marine Corps was built to keep and protect the material history of the United States Marines. Barbara Klein takes us for a visit.

BARBARA KLEIN:

Iron Mike statue at National Museum of the Marine Corps

The National Museum of the Marine Corps is divided into eight areas. The first is an open place just inside the entrance. In the center is a sixty-four meter long structure that rises to reach a glass roof.

Hanging from the roof are airplanes used by Marines in conflicts around the world.

These include Corsair fighter planes from World War Two and the Korean War. They also include a Curtiss “Jenny” plane from wars in Central America in the nineteen twenties.

World War Two landing craft

A landing vehicle used in World War Two and a Sikorsky helicopter from the Korean War are also in this area.

Other areas of the museum show the Marine experience through pictures, paintings and models of Marines in historic situations. The World War Two area shows how Marines fought and died in the Pacific campaign against Japanese forces.

The Marine war experience is also seen in areas about World War One, the Korean War, the war in Vietnam and the Global War on Terrorism. In the Vietnam War area, visitors experience the Battle of Khe Sanh.

On the second floor, visitors can eat in a place that looks like the historic Tun Tavern where the Corps was founded in seventeen seventy-five. Or they can eat in a cafeteria that looks like a mess hall where Marines eat today.

The Marine Band is the nation's oldest professional music group

The second floor also holds temporary exhibits. One of these is about the Marine Band, the oldest professional music group in the United States. The exhibit tells the history of the band and its famous leader, John Philip Sousa.

We leave our visit to the National Museum of the Marine Corps with music written by Sousa for the Marines. It is called “Semper Fidelis.” That is the Marine Corps official saying. It is Latin for “Always Faithful.”

Murphy's Law

HOST:

Our VOA Listener question this week comes from Vietnam. Quang Khoi asks about Murphy’s Law.

Murphy’s Law is an American expression whose meaning spread around the world. Murphy’s Law says: "Everything that can possibly go wrong will go wrong." Like many other popular sayings, it is difficult to find one explanation for it.

Edward Murphy

Those trying to explain Murphy’s Law agree that it began in the United States Air Force. The Air Force says the expression was named for officer Edward Murphy. He was an engineer working on a project in space flight research in nineteen forty-nine.

One story says Captain Murphy was commenting about the failure of some equipment he was using in an experiment. He reportedly criticized the worker responsible by saying: “If there is a way to do it wrong, he will find it." Another official heard this and called it Murphy’s Law.

Another story is found in a book called “A History of Murphy’s Law” by Nick Spark. It says members of the research team working with Captain Murphy created a similar phrase: “If it can happen, it will happen”. They called this Murphy’s Law. But Mister Spark later said there is no way to really know who invented the expression.

Still, many stories say the first use of the term Murphy’s Law was at a press conference several weeks later. John Paul Stapp was an Air Force captain at the time. He spoke to reporters about the tests completed by Captain Murphy and his team. Doctor Stapp said no one was injured during the tests because the Air Force considered "Murphy’s Law" before carrying out their experiments.

He said this meant that they considered everything that could go wrong before a test and planned how to prevent those mistakes from happening.

Today, you can find examples of Murphy's Law in everyday life. You might say that if you drop a slice of buttered bread on the floor, it will always land with the buttered side down. Or, the day you forget to bring your umbrella, it is sure to rain.

Nellie McKay

Nellie McKay is a young singer and songwriter who works hard to protect her artistic independence. Her new album, “Pretty Little Head,” has twenty-three creative and unusual songs. Critics are praising McKay’s musical skill and ability to sing many kinds of music. Katharine Cole has more.

(MUSIC)

KATHARINE COLE:

That is the energetic song “Columbia is Bleeding." It is a protest song expressing Nellie McKay’s interest in animal rights. McKay opposes the way animals have been treated in experiments at Columbia University in New York City.

But not all the songs on “Pretty Little Head” are political. The album has songs with many different styles and meanings. Some are serious while others are playful and funny. Here is “We Had it Right.” Nellie McKay sings with the well-known musician K.D. Lang.

(MUSIC)

Nellie McKay made her first album with the major company Columbia Records. But she had her own ideas about her second album. She wanted “Pretty Little Head” to have twenty-three songs on two compact disks. Columbia Records wanted her to make a shorter album. So, McKay left Columbia Records and started her own record company, Hungry Mouse Records. She can now make her own decisions about her music.

We leave you with the playful beat of “Pink Chandelier”. Nellie McKay sings in a gentle voice about dancing and strangers in the night.

(MUSIC)

HOST:

I'm Doug Johnson.

A listener from China recently sent us a question about Special English broadcasters. Jin Yan wants to learn more about them and see pictures of them. You can now learn about our broadcasters and see their pictures on our Web site at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also read the text of this program and download audio. And be sure to send us a picture of yourself for our growing photo collection of Special English listeners on our Web site.

This program was written by Dana Demange and Nancy Steinbach. Caty Weaver was the producer. Join us again next week for AMERICAN MOSAIC, VOA’s radio magazine in Special English.

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Slang in the World of Hooky Bulls, Businessman's Events and Dirt Baths

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Howdy. I'm Adam Phillips, sitting in for Avi Arditti and Rosanne Skirble. For this week's Wordmaster, we go the rodeo.

SPEAKER: "Welcome to the Montana rodeo on a Saturday night!"

The Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association is holding its national championships this week in Las Vegas, Nevada. It's the culmination of hundreds of county and state rodeo competitions, like this one at the Beaverhead, Montana, County Fair.

(SOUND)

It's a special kind of athletics on display at the rodeo, where riders show off their cattle-roping skills or struggle to stay aboard wildly bucking horses and bulls. And the rodeo air is always filled with the special words that bull riders, ropers, and steer wrestlers use to describe what they do. It's not always easy to understand what they're saying. Rodeo organizer Jack Bergeson explains, for example, that the rodeo term bulldogging has nothing to do with either bulls or dogs.

Jack Bergeson

JACK BERGESON: "It's another word for steer wrestling. You come out of the chute and you are going out full speed and you are jumping off a horse onto a steer and trying to throw it down. The steer would be the bull and dogging itwould be wrestling with it and throwing it down. It's a big man's event. They call timed events businessman's events because [with those] you're not out there getting dirty like the ruffies."

Ruffies are the rodeo cowboys who take the greatest risks. They ride wild horses called broncs, or they ride horses without saddles, or they take a timed ride on bulls hand-picked for their mean tempers. Animals like that are called rank.

Breaking a horse is one well-known cowboy term for taming or training a spirited horse so that it will accept a saddle and a rider. But one cowboy I talked to says that even horses that are ridden bareback -- that is, without saddles -- are fitted with what is called rigging.

COWBOY: "It's a bareback rigging. It's small, little piece of leather, 10 or 12 inches wide, and that's what these guys hang on to with one hand. That's called a rigging. I don't know if that's so much slang but it's a unique term."

A steer wrassler at the ready

Many timed rodeo events based on ranching skills. For example, steer wrestling, or wrassling as it's usually pronounced on the rodeo circuit, is an event where a steer is cornered, roped, then wrestled to the ground and immobilized. And it is often necessary on the ranch to ride wild, untamed horses in order to train them. Riding wild bulls probably began as a wild entertainment.

Whatever the animal chosen -- steer, wild horse or bull -- chances are excellent the cowboy will soon be hitting the ground himself.

JACK BERGESON: "There is phrase we like to use. It's called the dirt bath. A dirt bath is when you fall off this horse or this bull, you are falling quite a ways. And when you hit the ground, you took yourself a dirt bath! Because you are hitting that dirt pretty hard."

Rodeo work is dangerous work, and cowboys can get hurt or even killed. Bull riding -- where a cowboy jumps atop a wild bull weighing 800 kilograms or more, and tries to ride it for a full seven seconds before being thrown -- is especially risky.

Once the rider is thrown -- and he always is -- he is protected by so-called rodeo clowns like Kevin Higley of Hooper, Utah, who jump into the ring to distract the animal and prevent the cowboy from being gored when the horned bull is feeling, as they say, hooky.

Kevin Higley

KEVIN HIGLEY: "Hooky means he's gonna come after you and he's gonna fight. And look out, because he's gonna try to get you and hook you out of there. If you get a guy punching his hand with his fist and saying 'this bull is gonna be hooky,' there is a pretty good chance he is going to thump somebody before he gets out of the arena. It's just 'getting thumped.' 'You're gonna get thumped if you don't watch what's going on.'

"Some other things we use is [the phrase] pull your skirt up. The romance of the Western scene is a little different than the professional athletes you see on the professional football games. We all have to keep ourselves in pretty good shape. But we don't have the professional trainers who follow us around and say 'Aw, its okay, you don't need to go out there today.' You got to get out there and just go. So just life your skirt up and get on with it. Get to the next one."

And rodeo manager Jack Bergeson and his pals say there are plenty of phrases for the tourists and other non-rodeo types who come to the rodeo just to be entertained -- safely.

JACK BERGESON AND OTHERS: "Rookies, city slickers -- you know ... you! [Laughter]"

Maybe it's time for me to be skinnin' it -- that is, getting out of here -- before someone puts me on a horse. For Wordmaster, I'm Adam Phillips at the rodeo in Dillon, Montana.

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Higher Education in US: Many Schools Accept the IELTS

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The International English Language Testing System measures true-to-life ability to communicate, its British developers say. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

A few weeks ago, we talked about the Test of English as a Foreign Language, or TOEFL. A listener in Cambodia named Thida asks if American colleges and universities also accept the IELTS exam. IELTS is the International English Language Testing System. It was developed by University of Cambridge ESOL Examinations.

Cambridge University

Cambridge ESOL says the test measures true-to-life ability to communicate in English for education, immigration or employment. The IELTS tests listening, reading, writing and speaking skills. It uses a mixture of accents and spellings, including British English and American English.

The test is used by government agencies, schools and professional organizations in one hundred twenty countries. And, yes, that includes the United States. The many American schools that accept the IELTS can be found on the Web at ielts.org.

Some schools accept both the TOEFL and the IELTS. But the graduate school at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, for example, says it prefers the IELTS.

The listening and speaking parts are the same for everyone who takes the IELTS. But people have a choice of reading and writing tests -- either academic or general training.

The listening test takes thirty minutes. There are forty questions based on a recording.

The reading test takes sixty minutes. Students answer forty questions based on three written passages.

The writing test also takes sixty minutes. Students have to write two essays. One essay has to be at least one hundred fifty words long and the other at least two hundred fifty words. The shorter one is a description of something; the longer one has to support an argument.

The speaking test takes less than fifteen minutes. The score is based on a recorded talk between the student and a test examiner.

And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. A link to the IELTS Web site can be found at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also find MP3 files and transcripts from our Foreign Student Series. Next week our subject will be the GMAT, a test for getting into graduate programs in business and management.

If you have a general question for our series, write to special@voanews.com. I'm Barbara Klein.

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World War Two in the Pacific Comes to a Fiercely Fought Close in 1945

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Japan surrenders after the US uses the atomic bomb. Transcript of radio broadcast:

VOICE ONE:

THE MAKING OF A NATION -- a program in Special English by the Voice of America.

(MUSIC)

American military planners had to make an important decision when the United States entered the Second World War in late nineteen forty-one.

They could not fight effectively at the same time in Asia and Europe. They decided to use most of their forces to defeat the German troops of Adolf Hitler. Only after victory was clear in Europe would they use all of America's strength to fight against Japan in Asia and the Pacific.

This decision had important results. Japan was able to win many of the early battles of the war in Asia. Our program today is about the fighting in the Pacific.

VOICE TWO:

(SOUND)

Japanese planes. Out of the sky they came -- suddenly, secretly -- bombing the American military base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in a deadly attack

The Japanese raid in December nineteen forty-one marked the beginning of several major victories for Tokyo. The Japanese destroyed Pearl Harbor. They attacked American bases in the Philippines and destroyed those, too. Within days, Japan captured the American island of Guam. Japanese troops landed in Thailand, marched into Malaya, and seized Hong Kong. The Japanese moved into Indonesia and Burma.

Even Hitler's troops in Europe had not moved so quickly or successfully. As one American historian wrote later, the Pacific Ocean looked like a Japanese lake.

VOICE ONE:

Washington tried to fight back. A group of American planes successfully bombed Tokyo in a surprise raid. However, Japan knew it was winning the war. Its leaders believed no army could stop them. So they expanded their goals and launched new campaigns.

This was Japan's mistake. It stretched its forces too thin, too quickly. The military leaders in Tokyo believed that the United States could not resist because it was busy fighting the war in Europe. But not even Japan could extend its communications and fighting power over such a great distance and continue to win.

The USS Yorktown, left, and the USS Balch in the Battle of Midway, June 1942

VOICE TWO:

The turning point came in June nineteen forty-two in the central Pacific in the great battle of Midway Island.

Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto launched the battle. He wanted to meet and destroy the remaining ships of the American fleet before Washington had time to rebuild them.

Yamamoto had one hundred sixty-two ships.

The American admiral, Chester Nimitz, had just seventy-six. But the United States had learned how to understand the secret messages of the Japanese forces.

For this reason, Nimitz and the Americans knew exactly where the Japanese ships would sail. And they put their own ships in the best places to stop them.

The fighting between the two sides was fierce. But when it ended, the Americans had won a great victory. Admiral Yamamoto was forced to call off his attack and sail home. For the first time, the Japanese Navy had been defeated.

VOICE ONE:

The next big battle was at Guadalcanal, one of the Solomon Islands in the southwestern Pacific. Guadalcanal's beaches were wide and flat. Japanese officers decided to build a military airbase there. The United States learned of this. It decided it had to prevent Japan from establishing such a base.

American marines quickly landed on the island. They were joined by troops from Australia and New Zealand. But Japanese ships launched a surprise attack and destroyed many of the American ships in the harbor. Allied forces on the island were left without naval support and suffered terrible losses.

For six months, the two sides fought for control of the island. Historian Samuel Eliot Morrison later described the action this way:

VOICE TWO:

"For us who were there," Morrison wrote, "Guadalcanal is not a name but an emotion. Remembering terrible fights in the air. Fierce naval battles. Bloody fighting in the jungle. Nights broken by screaming bombs and the loud explosions of naval guns."

VOICE ONE:

The fighting continued, seemingly forever. But finally, in February nineteen forty-three, the Japanese were forced to leave Guadalcanal.

The battle was an important defeat for Japan. It opened the door for the American and other Allied forces to go on the attack after months of defensive fighting.

VOICE TWO:

Douglas MacArthur

American military planners did not agree about the best way to launch such an attack. Admiral Nimitz of the Navy wanted to capture the small groups of Japanese-held islands in the Pacific, then seize Taiwan, and finally attack Japan itself. But General Douglas MacArthur of the Army thought it best to attack through New Guinea and the Philippines.

The American leadership finally decided to launch both attacks at once. Both Nimitz and MacArthur succeeded. Nimitz and his Navy forces moved quickly through the Marianas and other islands. General MacArthur attacked through New Guinea and into the Philippines. In the battle for Leyte Gulf, American ships completely destroyed Japanese naval power.

Throughout the Pacific Ocean and eastern Asia, the fighting continued. Many of the fiercest battles were fought on tiny Pacific islands. Japanese troops captured the islands early in the war. And they quickly built strong defenses to prevent Allies from invading.

Allied military leaders found a way to defeat the Japanese plan. They simply avoided the islands where the Japanese were strong and attacked other islands.

But sometimes the Allies could not avoid battle. They had to land on some islands to seize airfields for American planes.

VOICE ONE:

The names of these islands became well-known to soldiers and families throughout the world. Tarawa in the Gilbert islands. Truk in the Marshall Islands. Saipan in the Marianas. And other islands, too, such as Guam and Tinian.

The two sides fought fiercely in the battle of Iwo Jima. And Japanese forces on Okinawa resisted for eighty-three days before finally being defeated by Allied troops.

VOICE TWO:

After the defeat at Okinawa, many Japanese people understood that the war was lost, even if Japan had not yet surrendered. The emperor appointed a new prime minister and ordered him to explore the possibilities of peace.

But both sides still expected the Allies to launch a final invasion into Japan itself. And everyone knew that the cost in human life would be terrible for both sides.

But the final invasion never came.

Hiroshima after an American plane dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city on August 6, 1945

For years, American scientists had been developing a secret weapon, the atomic bomb. The United States dropped one of the bombs on the Japanese city of Hiroshima and another on Nagasaki. More than one hundred thousand persons were killed.

Tokyo surrendered within days.

VOICE ONE:

Suddenly, sooner than expected, the war was ended. More than twenty-five million soldiers and civilians had died during the six years of fighting. Germany and Japan were defeated. The Soviet Union was strong in much of eastern Europe. And the United States found it had become the world's strongest military, economic and political power.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

You have been listening to THE MAKING OF A NATION, a program in Special English. Your narrators were Harry Monroe and Rich Kleinfeldt. Our program was written by David Jarmul. The Voice of America invites you to listen again next week to THE MAKING OF A NATION.

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Edwin Hubble Changed Our Ideas About the Universe and Its Birth

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Today the space telescope named for him helps astronomers carry on his work and make new discoveries. Transcript of radio broadcast:

ANNOUNCER:

EXPLORATIONS -- a program in Special English by the Voice of America.

(MUSIC)

Edwin Hubble

Today, Richard Rael and Tony Riggs tell the story of American astronomer Edwin Hubble. He changed our ideas about the universe and how it developed. Edwin Hubble made his most important discoveries in the nineteen twenties. Today, other astronomers continue the work he began. Many of them are using the Hubble Space Telescope that is named after him.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Edwin Powell Hubble was born in eighteen eighty-nine in Marshfield, Missouri. He spent his early years in the state of Kentucky. Then he moved with his family to Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of Chicago. He studied mathematics and astronomy.

Hubble was a good student. He was a good athlete, too. He was a member of the University of Chicago championship basketball team in nineteen-oh-nine. He also was an excellent boxer. Several people urged him to train for the world heavyweight boxing championship after college. Instead, he decided to continue his studies. He went to Queen's College at Oxford, England.

At Oxford, Hubble studied law. He was interested in British Common Law, because his family had come to America from England many years before. He spent three years at Oxford.

In nineteen thirteen, Hubble returned to the United States. He opened a law office in Louisville, Kentucky. After a short time, however, he decided he did not want to be a lawyer. He returned to the University of Chicago. There, once again, he studied astronomy.

VOICE ONE:

Hubble watched the night sky with instruments at the university's Yerkes Observatory. His research involved a major question astronomers could not answer: What are nebulae?

The astronomical term "nebulae," Hubble explained, had come down through the centuries. It was the name given to permanent, cloudy areas in the sky outside our solar system. Some astronomers thought nebulae were part of our Milky Way galaxy. Others thought they were island universes farther away in space. In his research paper, Hubble said the issue could be decided only by more powerful instruments. And those instruments had not yet been developed.

VOICE TWO:

In nineteen seventeen, the United States was fighting in World War One in Europe. Edwin Hubble joined the American army and served in France.

Earlier, astronomer George Ellery Hale had offered Hubble a position at the Mount Wilson Observatory in Southern California. When Hubble returned to the United States after World War One, he accepted Hale's offer. Hubble was thirty years old. He was just beginning the work that would make him famous.

VOICE ONE:

In his first observations from Mount Wilson, Hubble used a telescope with a mirror one hundred fifty-two centimeters across. He studied objects within our own galaxy. And he made an important discovery about nebulae.

Hubble said the light that appeared to come from nebulae really came from stars near the nebulae. The nebulae, he said, were clouds of atoms and dust. They were not hot enough -- like stars -- to give off light.

Soon after, Hubble began working with a larger and more powerful telescope at Mount Wilson. Its mirror was two hundred fifty centimeters across. It was the most powerful telescope in the world for twenty-five years. It had the power Hubble needed to make his major discoveries.

VOICE TWO:

From nineteen twenty-two on, Edwin Hubble began examining more and more distant objects. His first great discovery was made when he recognized a Cepheid variable star. It was in the outer area of the great nebula called Andromeda. Cepheid variable stars are stars whose brightness changes at regular periods.

An astronomer at Harvard College, Henrietta Leavitt, had discovered that these periods of brightness could be used to measure the star's distance from Earth. Hubble made the measurements. They showed that the Andromeda nebula lay far outside our Milky Way Galaxy.

Hubble's discovery ended a long dispute. He proved wrong those who believed nebulae lay inside the Milky Way. And he proved that nebulae were galaxies themselves. Astronomers now agree that far distant galaxies do exist.

VOICE ONE:

Hubble then began to observe more details about galaxies. He studied their shape and brightness. By nineteen twenty-five, he had made enough observations to say that the universe is organized into galaxies of many shapes and sizes.

As stars differ from one another, he said, so do galaxies. Some are spiral galaxies like the Milky Way and Andromeda. They have a center, and arms of matter that seem to circle the center like a pinwheel. Others are shaped like baseballs or eggs. A few have no special shape.

VOICE TWO:

Hubble proposed a system to describe galaxies by their shape. His system still is used today. He also showed that galaxies are similar in the kinds of bright objects they contain. All galaxies, he said, are related to each other, much as members of a family are related to each other.

In the late nineteen twenties, Hubble studied the movement of galaxies through space. His investigation led to the most important astronomical discovery of the Twentieth century -- the expanding universe.

VOICE ONE:

Earlier observations about the movement of galaxies had been done by V. M. Silpher. He discovered that galaxies are moving away from Earth at speeds between three hundred kilometers a second and one thousand eight hundred kilometers a second.

Hubble understood the importance of Silpher's findings. He developed a plan for measuring both the distance and speed of as many galaxies as possible. With his assistant at Mount Wilson, Milton Humason, Hubble measured the movement of galaxies. The two men did this by studying what Hubble called the "red shift." It also is known as the "Doppler effect."

The Doppler effect explains changes in the length of light waves or sound waves as they move toward you or away from you. Light waves from an object speeding away from you will stretch into longer wavelengths. They appear red. Light waves from an object speeding toward you will have shorter wavelengths. They appear blue.

VOICE TWO:

Observations of forty-six galaxies showed Hubble that the galaxies were traveling away from Earth. The observations also showed that the speed was linked directly to the galaxies' distance from Earth. Hubble discovered that the farther away a galaxy is, the greater its speed. This scientific rule is called "Hubble's Law."

Hubble's discovery meant a major change in our idea of the universe.

The universe had not been quiet and unchanging since the beginning of time, as many people had thought. It was expanding. And that, Hubble said, meant it probably began with an explosion of unimaginable force. The explosion often is called "the big bang."

VOICE ONE:

Hubble's work did not end with this discovery. He continued to examine galaxies. He continued to gain new knowledge about them. Astronomers from all over the world went to study with him.

Hubble left the Mount Wilson Observatory during World War Two. He did research for the United States War Department. He returned after the war. Then, he spent much of his time planning a new, much larger telescope in Southern California. The telescope was completed in nineteen forty-nine. It had a mirror five hundred centimeters across. It was named after astronomer George Ellery Hale.

VOICE TWO:

Edwin Hubble was the first person to use the Hale Telescope. He died in nineteen fifty-three while preparing to spend four nights looking through the telescope at the sky.

Hubble's work led to new research on the birth of the universe. One astronomer said scientists have been filling in the details ever since. And, he said, there is a long way to go.

(MUSIC)

ANNOUNCER:

This Special English program was written by Marilyn Rice Christiano. Your narrators were Richard Rael and Tony Riggs. Listen again next week for another EXPLORATIONS program on the Voice of America.

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Waltzing Pumps Up Heart Patients

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A study finds that dancing can be good for patients with heart failure. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Health Report.

A social dancing program at a senior citizen center in Brooklyn, New York

Dancing is good exercise. Now a study shows it can improve the health and quality of life of people with mild to moderate heart failure.

Heart failure is not the same as a heart attack or heart stoppage. It means the heart is weakened and cannot pump blood normally. As a result, blood and fluid collect in the lungs and fluid builds up in the feet and legs.

This condition develops over time. In the United States, heart failure is a cause or the cause of about three hundred thousand deaths each year. So says the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

People with heart failure get tired and short of breath easily. Daily activities become difficult. But their doctors may want them to perform aerobic exercise at least three times a week. Aerobic exercise is activity that makes the heart and lungs work harder and increases oxygen use.

Many patients, though, lose interest in traditional programs of exercise training.

So researchers tested the effects of dancing. They chose waltz dancing because it is internationally known. They presented the study at a recent meeting of the American Heart Association.

Doctor Romualdo Belardinelli at Lancisi Heart Institute in Ancona, Italy, led the study. It involved eighty-nine men and twenty-one women with mild to moderate heart failure. The average age was fifty-nine.

One group of forty-four people took part in a supervised program of riding exercise bicycles and walking on treadmills three times a week.

Forty-four others danced three times a week. Each time, they danced a combination of slow waltzes and fast waltzes for twenty-one minutes. A third group with twenty-two people did not exercise. All three groups were observed for eight weeks.

The study found improved oxygen use in both the dance and exercise groups, so the people got tired less easily. The dancers showed an eighteen percent improvement. In the exercise group, it was sixteen percent. The group that did not exercise had no improvement.

The researchers say the findings were the same as an earlier study of slow and fast waltzing. That study showed it was safe for patients with heart disease and a history of heart attacks. Doctor Belardinelli says doctors have to find something that may capture the interest of patients. He says exercise should be fun, so people will want to continue for a lifetime.

And that’s the VOA Special English Health Report, written by Lawan Davis. I’m Barbara Klein.

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More Americans Take on the Physical Test of Marathon Races

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There were 380,000 finishers last year. Transcript of radio broadcast:

VOICE ONE:

Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

VOICE TWO:

Runners gather on the Verrazano Bridge at the start of the New York City Marathon

And I’m Barbara Klein. Many people enjoy running. But one kind of race, the marathon, has captured the imagination of people all over the world. The race has roots in ancient history. But there is nothing ancient about today’s modern sports and social events.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Many Americans enjoy the experience of running a forty-two kilometer race. Three hundred fourteen marathons were held in the United States last year. An estimated three hundred eighty-two thousand runners completed these marathons. And that number is expected to increase this year.

The biggest marathon in the nation is the New York City marathon. The runners pass famous landmarks in America’s most famous city. It also is a major sporting event with at least one hundred thousand dollars going to each winner.

On November fifth, almost thirty-eight thousand people finished the race. Marilson Gomes dos Santos of Brazil was the men’s champion in just under two hours and ten minutes. Jelena Prokopcuka of Latvia was the women’s champion for the second straight year. She finished in just over two hours and twenty-five minutes.

The most famous person in the race, however, may have been bicyclist Lance Armstrong. The seven-time Tour de France champion made big news by running in this year’s race. Armstrong’s excellent physical condition helped him complete the marathon in just under three hours. Fewer than two percent of all marathon runners do that. But, after the race, Armstrong admitted that the race was "the hardest physical thing I have ever done."

VOICE TWO:

While the New York City marathon is the biggest, the Boston Marathon in Massachusetts is the oldest and equally famous. The Boston Athletic Association started the race in eighteen ninety-seven. That is less than one year after the first Olympic marathon in Athens, Greece.

Boston is unlike most other big marathons because it is held in April. Boston is also famous for another first. Roberta Gibb became the first woman to unofficially run that marathon in nineteen sixty-six. At the time, male racing officials did not believe women could run marathons. It was not until nineteen seventy-two that women could officially compete in Boston. The Olympics did not hold a women’s marathon event until nineteen eighty-four in Los Angeles, California.

VOICE ONE:

Today’s marathons do not bar anyone because of sex or age. Many middle-aged people like to spend a weekend visiting a new city and running a marathon there. Time magazine has called the middle-aged people of today the "marathon generation." Forty-three percent of marathon runners in the United States are forty years old or older.

The sport has spread among people who are interested in health and fitness. The lifestyle of this age group has changed a lot since the nineteen seventies when many marathons started to be organized.

Racing has expanded to average runners. They can take part in races from five to ten kilometers. Hundreds of these races are organized in the United States every year. They are often in connection with a cause like fighting disease or supporting local hospitals and schools.

Marathons are a natural extension of the fitness movement. Many offer training programs, usually in cooperation with a local running club. These programs help runners, who never thought they could run forty-two kilometers, prepare for the big race.

VOICE TWO:

There are many organizations for marathoners. For example, there is a Fifty States Marathon Club. People who want to run marathons in all fifty states can join. For people who want to run farther, ultra-marathons take running to a different level. An ultra-marathon is any race longer than a marathon.

One of the oldest is the Western States Endurance Run, held every June. Runners race from Squaw Valley, California, to the town of Auburn through a high mountain pass. The race is one hundred sixty kilometers long. This year, two hundred ten people finished the race. The winner, Graham Cooper, finished in eighteen hours and seventeen minutes.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Washington, D.C., has its own major marathon. The Marine Corps Marathon is the fifth largest race in the country. This year almost twenty thousand runners completed the race. An estimated one hundred twenty thousand people watched the race. Our Special English writer Mario Ritter tells us about his experience running the Marine Corps Marathon October twenty-ninth.

MARIO RITTER:

First, I must say that my experience preparing for and running a marathon is my own. If you want to run a marathon, talk to your doctor. See if you are healthy enough to try this difficult event and set realistic goals. As we will see, too much exercise at one time can be dangerous.

A marathon really starts several months before the race. I would run about five days every week to prepare for my marathon run. Most runs were for half an hour. I would try to run for an hour or more each Sunday. This is a very basic way for an average runner like myself to prepare.

But running in a big marathon with thousands of other runners is an unforgettable experience that you really cannot prepare for.

(SOUND)

There is a lot of shouting at the start of the race. I think runners want to release some tension. They have three to five hours of hard running ahead of them.

The hardest part of the first half of a marathon is avoiding other runners in narrow areas on the road. The field of runners remains crowded until about the twenty kilometer point in the race. People are also running their fastest. It is important to keep your balance and avoid tripping other runners or yourself.

About fifteen kilometers into the race, the road turned in such a way that my group of runners could see the leader. He was Jared Nyamboki of Kenya. He looked to be running well on this cold windy morning. I guessed that he would be the winner because he had a big lead.

I later found out that Mexican Ruben Garcia had passed Nyamboki at about the thirty-three kilometer mark. Nyamboki had started at a rate that would have given him the record for the event. But he slowed and later stopped. Garcia won the race in a time of two hours and twenty-one minutes.

I was having my own problems at the time Garcia was crossing the finish line. At the twenty-fourth kilometer, my leg muscles started to become very tense. I could not stretch my legs out to take a normal step, or stride. Taking smaller strides, I was going slower and slower.

(MUSIC)

I had met my speed goal for the first half of the marathon. But now, I could see I would not reach my goal of three hours and forty-five minutes for the race.

Running slower did offer me a chance to look around. A young man dressed like Superman passed me. He drew many cheers from the crowd and added to the holiday-like atmosphere.

A marathon is in many ways a social event. There is also a sense of community. Observers are as much a part of the race as the runners. Almost every age group is present. The youngest competitor to finish was fourteen years old. The oldest was eighty-two.

And there is a lot of evidence of social change. When I started running in high school fewer women ran. In this marathon, forty percent of the competitors are women. In fact, women are running faster and longer distances. Laura Thompson won this year’s race in just over three hours. That puts her in the top two percent of all marathon runners.

Paula Radcliff of Britain holds the women’s world record at two hours fifteen minutes and twenty-five seconds. In fewer than forty years of running, women have lowered their world record at a much faster rate than men have in one hundred ten years. The future of marathons may hold more female overall winners.

The extreme physical demands of marathons can also be dangerous. This year, a fifty-six year-old man suffered a heart attack and later died.

(MUSIC)

I finished the marathon in four hours and three minutes. I had a lot of pain in my legs. And I had fallen short of my goal. But the experience was wonderful. I started planning my next marathon run that very afternoon.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Our program was written and produced by our marathon runner Mario Ritter. Audio of the Marine Corps Marathon was provided by Hank Silverberg of WTOP news. I'm Steve Ember.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Barbara Klein. Join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.

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For World AIDS Day, Leaders Are Urged to Keep Their Promises

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An American official says the Bush administration is on target to do just that. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Development Report.

World AIDS Day is December first. The message that the World AIDS Campaign has chosen for the two thousand five through two thousand ten observances is "Stop AIDS. Keep the Promise." The promise is a goal world leaders set in two thousand to halt the spread of AIDS by two thousand fifteen.

This year is the twenty-fifth anniversary of the first recognized cases of H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS.

The United Nations reported last week that the AIDS epidemic continues to grow. It says there will be almost three million AIDS-related deaths this year and more than four million new infections.

There were signs of reduced infection rates in some countries, but also evidence of renewed increases in others.

Mark Dybul at a recent briefing for VOA reporters

Mark Dybul was sworn in last month to lead the Bush administration program known as the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Ambassador Dybul says the administration is on target for keeping its promises to fight AIDS.

President Bush announced the five-year, fifteen-thousand-million-dollar plan during his State of the Union speech in two thousand three. Efforts have centered on fifteen nations in Africa, the Caribbean and Asia. They represent about half of the world's estimated forty million H.I.V. infections.

American officials say that last year, more than eighty percent of groups working with the United States against H.I.V./AIDS were local. U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Mark Dybul says these partnerships should not be considered donor-recipient relationships.

He described them at a recent meeting with VOA reporters as a chance for unified equal involvement. He says the United States can help. But to win the war against H.I.V./AIDS, he says, each country must take ownership of its individual fight.

The United States says it will spend about three hundred eighty million dollars this year on prevention programs in targeted countries. Officials say four hundred eighty million will go to care programs. And more than eight hundred sixty million will go to support treatment with antiretroviral drugs.

Critics have accused the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief of being slow to provide money to support its programs. Mark Dybul says this criticism is baseless. President Bush has asked Congress for more than four thousand million dollars in AIDS spending for two thousand seven.

And that's the VOA Special English Development Report, written by Jill Moss. You can learn more about AIDS and other issues facing developing countries at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

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Genetic Map Could Point Way to an Improved Honey Bee

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Researchers have sequenced the genes that make up this insect, which faces threats yet is so important to agriculture. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report.

Scientists now have a genetic map of the world's most important insect -- important to the food supply. The results showing the order, or sequence, of ninety-eight percent of the honey bee genome created a buzz of excitement. Understanding how a honey bee is designed should help scientists produce stronger bees.

Honey bees are the world's major source of pollination for food, fiber and oilseed crops. Bees gather nectar from flowers; the liquid gives them food and material to make honey. As they land, their bodies pick up and drop off fine particles of pollen. Most flowering plants need pollination to reproduce.

But Kevin Hackett, an official at the United States Department of Agriculture, noted that the world's honey bee population is decreasing. He called the sequencing of its genome a powerful tool for fighting back against the causes.

One cause is the varroa mite which can kill young bees even before they leave their eggs. Another is the tracheal mite which nests in the breathing tube of adult bees.

Some people think that insect poisons have also played a part in reducing bee populations.

Experts say honey bees are responsible for as much as twenty thousand million dollars worth of food production in the United States alone. But scientists have estimated that the bee population in the United States fell by fifty percent over the past half-century.

The main results of the Honey Bee Genome Sequencing Project Consortium appeared in the journal Nature. This international team is led by human-genome researchers at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. Related reports appeared in other publications.

Like humans, bees have genes that give them a sense of day and night. Scientists believe this helps honey bees gather food.

Bees find flowers by smell. Bees have more genes for a sense of smell than other insects whose genes have been mapped. But one of the project scientists noted they have fewer genes for taste. He thinks this might help them avoid pesticides and plant diseases to find food.

The genetic research suggests that honey bees came from Africa. Their brains have similar genetic parts as the fruit fly. But fruit flies like to be alone. Scientists are interested in how, over millions of years, honey bees developed the complex social order in which they live.

And that's the VOA Special English Agriculture Report, written by Jerilyn Watson. I'm Steve Ember.

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So You Want to Make Your Mother Proud? Becoming a Doctor

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A look at medical education in the US, which has more than 120 medical colleges. Transcript of radio broadcast:

VOICE ONE:

This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I'm Bob Doughty.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Barbara Klein. On our program this week, we look at how people become medical doctors in the United States.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

University of Massachusetts medical students study a body

The United States has more than one hundred twenty medical colleges. The American Association of Medical Colleges says these schools have about seventy thousand students.

How hard is it to get into one of the top medical schools, like for example the one at Yale University in Connecticut? Last year almost three thousand seven hundred students hoped to get accepted there. Only one hundred seventy-six -- or less than five percent -- were admitted.

More and more of the students getting accepted to medical schools are women. In fact, at Yale, those one hundred seventy-six first-year students included more women than men.

VOICE TWO:

People who want to become medical doctors often study large amounts of biology, chemistry and other science. Some students work for a year or two in a medical or research job before they try to get accepted to medical school.

Most people apply to more than one school. Some apply to as many as ten.

The Association of American Medical Colleges is changing the Medical College Admission Test, or MCAT. Starting in January, the MCAT will be offered as a computerized exam only -- no more paper-and-pencil test. The exam is given throughout North America and also in countries around the world.

The number of test dates will increase from two a year to twenty-two. And beginning in two thousand seven, the number of questions on the MCAT will be reduced by about one-third. So will the permitted testing time.

Students may take the MCAT exam up to three times a year.

VOICE ONE:

A medical education can be very costly, especially at a private school. One year at a private medical college can cost forty thousand dollars or more. The average at a public medical school is more than fifteen thousand dollars.

Most students have to take out loans to pay for medical school. Many finish their education heavily in debt.

Doctors are among the highest paid professionals in the United States. Specialists in big cities are generally the highest paid. But there are also doctors who earn considerably less, including those in poor communities.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Medical students spend their first two years in classroom study. They learn about the body and all of its systems. And they begin studying diseases -- how to recognize and treat them.

Some students say the first year is the most difficult. They have to remember lots of information -- like the name of every bone in the body.

By the third year, students -- guided by experienced doctors -- begin working with patients in hospitals. As the students watch and learn, they think about the kind of medicine they would like to practice as doctors.

During the fourth year, students begin applying to hospital programs for the additional training they will need after medical school. Competition for a residency at a top hospital can be fierce.

VOICE ONE:

Medical residents treat patients under the supervision of professors and other experienced doctors.

Most states require a person to complete at least one year of medical residency before taking examinations to work as a doctor.

Doctors-in-training are usually called interns during their first year of residency.

Medical residents get experience in different kinds of care. Interns, for example, may work with children one month. Then the next month they may be in the operating room. How long a residency lasts depends on the chosen area of medicine.

There are many specialties. Some people become cardiologists and care for the heart. Others become oncologists and treat cancer patients. Still others become pediatricians and take care of children. And some doctors go into medical research, either at a university or a biotechnology company.

But whatever they choose, first they need training. Some doctors spend up to ten years serving in hospitals before they are fully trained in a specialty. Surgeons, for example, spend many years performing operations as residents.

VOICE TWO:

A doctor in Chicago, Illinois, remembers that before his internship, he wanted to work in crisis medicine. But he lost that interest after he interned in a hospital emergency room.

He saw many patients who needed help immediately -- like accident victims and victims of gunshot wounds. One of the things he likes about the specialty he chose, surgery, is that he usually has more time to decide how to help his patients.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Medical residents do not get paid very much and have traditionally been expected to work long hours without much sleep. A young family doctor in the state of Virginia says she learned a lot as a resident. But she says she might have learned even more if she had not been so tired.

In nineteen ninety-nine, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies published a report on medical mistakes in American hospitals. The report said preventable errors resulted in at least forty-four thousand and perhaps as many as ninety-eight thousand deaths each year.

In two thousand four, the New England Journal of Medicine published two government-financed studies of serious errors made by interns.

The researchers found that the error rates in two intensive-care departments decreased when interns worked fewer hours. The interns made fewer mistakes when they had to prescribe medicines and identify conditions.

VOICE TWO:

Some residents, however, say they need extended time with patients to observe changes in their condition. And some say residents need to work as much as they can so they can become good doctors.

But in two thousand three, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education reduced the hours that residents may work. The council supervises the training of residents. Some residents were spending one hundred or more hours a week at their hospitals. They were often on duty more than thirty-six hours at a time, with limited sleep.

The new rules limit residents to thirty hours of duty at a time. And a hospital is not supposed to require more than eighty hours of duty in a week. In addition, interns and residents must have one day off in every seven. But some residents say the new rules are not being followed by all hospitals.

VOICE ONE:

Paul Rockey is a medical educator in Illinois who has worked for years with residents. He says residencies today are more difficult than before. Patients do not stay as long in the hospital as they once did. So Doctor Rockey says there is a lot of pressure on young doctors to learn quickly.

He says the difficulties of a medical education may be great. But, he adds, people also get great satisfaction seeing themselves gain the knowledge and skills to become good doctors.

VOICE TWO:

We have talked about people who want to go to medical school in the United States. What about those who already have a medical education -- a foreign medical education -- and now want to work here as doctors? Traditionally this has not been easy. States require foreign doctors to pass tests and finish an approved residency or other medical program in the United States.

To be accepted for a residency, a person must meet the requirements of the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates. This certification process involves several tests before a person can receive a visa to stay in the United States for the training period.

Foreign medical graduates may be required to return to their own country for at least two years after they complete the training. But because of doctor shortages or other needs, some have been able to get visas without the required two-year stay in their home country.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

SCIENCE IN THE NEWS was written by Jerilyn Watson and produced by Brianna Bake. Internet users can find MP3 files and transcripts of our programs at voaspecialenglish.com. I’m Bob Doughty.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Barbara Klein. Listen again next week for more news about science in Special English on the Voice of America.

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Henry Ford, 1863-1947: He Revolutionized the Automobile Industry

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Others made cars; he made better cars. Transcript of radio broadcast:

ANNOUNCER:

PEOPLE IN AMERICA -- a program in Special English on the VOICE of America.

Every week at this time, we tell the story of a person was important in the history of the United States. Today Steve Ember and Frank Oliver begin the story of industrialist Henry Ford.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Henry Ford

Many people believe Henry Ford invented the automobile. But Henry Ford did not start to build his first car until eighteen ninety-six. That was eleven years after two Germans -- Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz -- developed the first gasoline-powered automobile.

Many people believe Henry Ford invented the factory system that moved a car's parts to the worker, instead of making the worker move to the parts. That is not true, either. Many manufacturers used this system before Ford.

What Henry Ford did was to use other people's ideas and make them better.

Others made cars. Henry Ford made better cars. And he sold them for less money. Others built car factories. Henry Ford built the biggest factory of its time. And he made the whole factory a moving production line.

Henry Ford had great skills in making machines work. He also had great skills as an organizer. His efforts produced a huge manufacturing company. But those same efforts almost ruined the company he built.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Henry Ford was born on a farm in the state of Michigan on July thirtieth, eighteen sixty-three. The farm was near the city of Detroit.

Henry was always interested in machines. He was always experimenting with them. He enjoyed fixing clocks. And he helped repair farm equipment. When Henry was sixteen years old, he left the family farm. He went to Detroit to learn more about machines.

In eighteen seventy-nine, when Henry began work in Detroit, the city was a center of industrial development. Travelers could tell they were near Detroit by the cloud of smoke that hung over the city. Detroit was a center of iron and steel making. Nearby mines of lead and salt brought chemical companies to the city. And Detroit's copper and brass business was the largest in the world.

ONE thing Henry Ford learned in Detroit was to have the right tool to do the job. It was something he would never forget.

VOICE ONE :

After three years in Detroit, Henry returned to his family farm. He remained on the farm until he was thirty years old. But he was not a real farmer. He was a machine man. A nearby farmer, for example, had bought a small steam engine to be used in farming. The machine did not work correctly. Henry agreed to try to fix it. At the end of just one day, Henry knew everything about the machine. And he made it work again.

Henry remembered that time as the happiest in his life. He said: "I was paid three dollars a day, and had eighty-three days of steady work. I have never been better satisfied with myself. "

Another thing that made those days happy was meeting a young woman. Her name was Clara Jane Bryant. Years later Henry said: "I knew in half an hour she was the one for me. " They were married in eighteen eighty-eight, on Clara's twenty-second birthday.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

Henry and Clara lived on a farm near Detroit. But, still, Henry was not a real farmer. He grew some food in a small garden. And he kept a few animals. But he made money mostly by selling trees from his farm. And he continued to fix farm equipment. It was really machines that he loved.

In eighteen ninety-one, Henry visited Detroit. There he saw a machine called the "silent otto. " It was a device powered by gasoline. It had been developed by a German, Nikolaus August Otto. He was one of the men who had worked with Gottlieb Daimler, who developed the first gasoline-powered automobile.

The silent otto did not move. But Henry saw immediately that if the machine could be put on wheels, it would move by itself.

He returned home to Clara with an idea to build such a machine. He was sure he could do it. But the machine would need electricity to make the engine work. And Henry had not learned enough about electricity. So he took a job with an electric power company in Detroit. Henry, his wife Clara, and his young son Edsel moved to the city.

VOICE ONE:

While Henry worked for the power company, he and a few other men developed a small engine. In June, eighteen ninety-six, Henry had his first automobile. He called it a "quadricycle. " It looked like two bicycles, side by side. It had thin tires like a bicycle. And it had a bicycle seat.

In eighteen ninety-nine, Henry resigned from the power company to work on his automobile. He won the support of a small group of rich men who formed the Detroit automobile company. By the start of nineteen-oh-one, however, the company had failed.

Another man might have decided that the automobile business was not the best business for him. He might have stopped. Henry Ford was just getting started.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

In the early days of the automobile, almost every car-maker raced his cars. It was the best way of gaining public notice. Henry Ford decided to build a racing car.

Ford's most famous race was his first. It also was the last race in which he drove the car himself.

The race was in nineteen-oh-one, at a field near Detroit. All of the most famous cars had entered. And all withdrew, except two. The Winton. And Ford's. The Winton was famous for its speed. Most people thought the race was over before it began.

The Winton took an early lead. But halfway through the race, it began to lose power. Ford started to gain. And near the end of the race, he took the lead. Ford won the race and defeated the champion. His name appeared in newspapers. His fame began to spread.

VOICE ONE:

Within weeks of the race, Henry Ford formed a new automobile company. He left soon after, however, because he could not agree with the investors. He had no trouble finding new ones.

Henry continued to build racing cars. His most famous cars of the time were the "Arrow" and the "Nine Ninety-Nine. " Both won races. And they helped make the name Henry Ford more famous.

Henry used what he learned from racing to develop a better engine. In nineteen-oh-three, he was ready to start building cars for the public. On July fifteenth, nineteen-oh-three, a man named Doctor Pfenning bought the first car from the Ford Motor Company.

VOICE TWO:

The sale to Doctor Pfenning was the beginning of a huge number of requests for Ford cars. By the end of March, nineteen-oh-four, almost six hundred Ford cars had been sold. The company had earned almost one hundred thousand dollars. Sales were so great that a new factory had to be found.

At the start of nineteen-oh-five, the Ford Motor Company was producing twenty-five cars each day. It employed three hundred men. The company produced several kinds of cars. First there was the "Model A. " Then there were the "Model B," "Model C" and "Model F. " They were just a little different from the "Model A" -- one of Ford's most famous cars.

Ford's "Model K" car was for wealthy buyers. One of the company's investors was sure the future of the automobile industry was in this costly car. Henry Ford did not agree. He was sure the future of the automobile industry was in a low-priced car for the general public. He said then, and many times after, "I want to make a car that anybody can buy. "

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

These conflicting beliefs led to a battle for control of the company. In the end, Henry bought the stock of the investors who wanted to make costly cars. He was then free to make the low-cost car he believed in.

The story shows the way Henry's mind worked. When he thought he was correct, he was willing to invest his efforts and his money. Earlier, he had walked away from the business of making cars when he could not control the business. Now he had the money to buy the stock of those who disagreed with him.

VOICE ONE:

In nineteen-oh-seven, Henry Ford said: "I will build a motor car for the great mass of people. It will be large enough for the family, but small enough for one person to operate and care for. It will be built of the best materials. It will be built by the best men to be employed. And it will be built with the simplest plans that modern engineering can produce. It will be so low in price that no man making good money will be unable to own one. "

That was what Henry Ford wanted. To reach his goal, his life took many interesting turns. That will be our story next week.

(Theme)

VOICE TWO:

You have been listening to the Special English program PEOPLE IN AMERICA. Your narrators were Steve Ember and Frank Oliver. Our program was written by Richard Thorman. I'm Ray Freeman.

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Deep Six: It Is Well Hidden

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Sailors who never want to see something again will give it the deep-six. Transcript of radio broadcast:

Now, the VOA Special English program, Words and Their Stories.

(MUSIC)

Sailors seem -- to those of us on land -- to lead exciting, even mysterious lives. Many things are different at sea. Even the language is different.

Simple words like "right" and "left" are not the same. On a ship, "right" is "starboard." And "left" is "port."

Sailors also are responsible for many colorful English expressions.

One of these is deep-six. It means to hide something or put it where it will not be found. You can also deep-six, or reject a proposal.

One language expert says that deep six is the bottom of the ocean. "Deep," in this case, means deepest. The "six" in the expression comes from the six feet that make up a fathom -- which is a little less than two meters.

Sailors measure the depth of the water in fathoms. Thus, the deep six is the deepest fathom...the final six feet at the bottom of the ocean. A sailor who never wants to see something again will give it the deep-six. He will drop it from the ship to the ocean bottom.

You can deep-six something even if you are not a sailor. All you do is throw it away or put it where it will never be found. You might, for example, deep-six an unplesant letter from a former friend.

Another expression linked to sailing is batten down the hatches. That is what sailors do to prepare their ship for a storm at sea.

Battens are thin pieces of wood. Hatches are the openings in the deck. Before a storm, sailors cover the hatches with waterproof material. Then they nail on battens to hold the hatch coverings firmly in place. This keeps rain and waves out of the ship.

Now, people use the expression to mean to prepare for dealing with any kind of trouble.

A news report, for example, might say that people in Washington were battening down the hatches for a big winter storm. Or a newspaper might report that "defense lawyers were 'battening down the hatches' for testimony by someone who observed the crime."

An old expression of the sailors that is still heard is to sail under false colors. Experts on language say the expression was born more than two hundred fifty years ago, when pirates sailed the seas, attacking and robbing trade ships.

Pirate ships often flew the flag of a friendly country as they sailed toward the ship they planned to rob. They sailed under false colors until they were close enough to attack. Then the pirates pulled down the false flag, and showed their true colors. They raised the pirate flag -- with its picture of a skull and crossed bones.

Today, a person, not a ship, is said to sail under false colors. Such a person appears to be something he is not. His purpose is to get something from you. If you are careful, you will soon see his true colors, and have nothing to do with him.

(MUSIC)

This VOA Special English program, Words and Their Stories, was written by Marilyn Christiano. This is Warren Scheer.

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International Day Aims to Bring Violence Against Women Out of Dark

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November 25 is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English.

For years, activists for the rights of women have marked November twenty-fifth as an important date. It is a day to recognize the goal of ending violence against women.

November twenty-fifth was chosen to honor three sisters in the Dominican Republic. The Mirabel sisters -- Minerva, Patria and Maria Teresa -- were political activists. They were killed on November twenty-fifth, nineteen sixty-one, on orders from dictator Rafael Trujillo.

Activists light candles Friday in Mumbai, India, to protest violence against women

In December of nineteen ninety-nine, the United Nations recognized the observance. The General Assembly declared November twenty-fifth the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.

The U.N. invited governments and international organizations to plan activities to increase public understanding of the problem.

Women face different forms of violence: physical, sexual and psychological. Having their property taken away when they have a legal right to it is considered economic violence.

It is difficult for researchers to understand the true extent of violence against women because the problem is often kept hidden. Many cases go unreported. The person responsible may be a stranger, but often it is a husband or someone else close to the victim.

In addition to November twenty-fifth, December tenth is observed each year as International Human Rights Day. The days in between are known as the "Sixteen Days of Activism Against Gender Violence." The idea is to make the statement that violence against women is a violation of human rights.

One of the events planned this week is a march by women and girls in London as part of an observance Saturday called Reclaim the Night.

In Senegal, organizers put together a four-day film festival in Dakar. Alia Nankoe is a program officer for the United Nations Population Fund in Senegal. She says the idea behind the film festival is to get people to face the issue of violence against women.

She is also working to organize local support systems for victims. She says this means that the police, the justice system and the social and health services are all trained and work together for the long term.

The images shown in the films may be difficult to watch. But the hope is that they will influence people to take action against a form of violence that many find difficult to talk about.

Victims are sometimes told to be quiet about their most horrible experiences. The worry is that they will become victims again -- this time, of the dishonor that may be placed on them by their communities.

The organizers of the film festival hope to make it a yearly event. After Senegal, the films will be translated into other languages and shown in other African countries.

IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English was written by Brianna Blake. You can download MP3 files and transcripts of our programs at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

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Pumpkins for All Seasons

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But bad weather in some US growing areas reduces supply of the Halloween favorite. Transcript of radio broadcast:

This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report.

Conditions for growing pumpkins were poor in some areas of the United States this year. The East and parts of the Midwest suffered heavy rains and extreme heat. So the supply for sale has decreased, making prices higher than last year.

Still, many people are buying the large, round fruit. Pumpkins are an important part of the American celebration of Halloween on October thirty-first. Many families visit farms or farmers markets so their children can pick out the pumpkins they want. They remove the insides of the pumpkin and cut pieces from the outside to make a face. Sometimes they place and light candles inside their carved pumpkin faces. People place the pumpkins outside their homes or in their windows.

Americans also use pumpkins for cooking, especially during the American holiday of Thanksgiving in late November. Tradition says early settlers ate pumpkin pie, or something similar to it. Pumpkins belong to the gourd family. They are related to melons, cucumbers and squashes. Some people call pumpkins vegetables. But others, including scientists, call them fruit. Pumpkins have hard skins and seeds in the center. And they contain more Vitamin A than almost any other fruit.

People have grown pumpkins in North and Central America for thousands of years. Pumpkins grow on vines or bushes. Most weigh only a few kilograms. But some pumpkins grow to be huge.

A farmer from the state of Rhode Island recently won a competition with a pumpkin that weighed six hundred eighty-one kilograms. It could be the largest in the world. Such super pumpkins are often shown at agricultural fairs.

Pumpkins get their start when bees fertilize their flowers. The insects carry reproductive material called pollen from the male to the female flowers. No pumpkins will grow if the female flower is not pollinated at the right time.

People use pumpkin in pies, breads, cakes and other baked goods. Many Americans also like to eat baked pumpkin seeds. Americans can also buy processed pumpkin in cans.

However, experts say it is not a good idea to process fresh pumpkin at home to use in the future because dangerous bacteria can develop. But whole pumpkins can store well for weeks in a cool, dark place.

And that’s the VOA Special English Agriculture Report, written by Jerilyn Watson. To read the next of this program and download audio, go to voaspecialenglish.com. I’m Steve Ember.

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D-Day, June 6, 1944: The Greatest Military Invasion in History

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Allied forces cross the English Channel to invade German-occupied France. Transcript of radio broadcast:

VOICE ONE:

Invasion at Normandy

THE MAKING OF A NATION -- a program in Special English by the Voice of America.

(MUSIC)

On June fifth, nineteen forty-four, a huge Allied force waited for the order to invade German-occupied France. The invasion had been planned for the day before. But a storm forced a delay.

At three-thirty in the morning, the Allied commander, General Dwight Eisenhower, was meeting with his assistants. The storm still blew outside the building.

General Eisenhower and his generals were discussing whether they should attack the next day.

VOICE TWO:

A weatherman entered the room. He reported that the weather soon would improve. All eyes turned to Eisenhower. The decision was his. His face was serious. And for a long time he was silent. Finally he spoke. "OK," he said, "we will go."

And so the greatest military invasion in the history of the world, D-Day, took place on June sixth, nineteen forty-four.

VOICE ONE:

The German leader, Adolph Hitler, had known the invasion was coming. But he did not know where the Allied force would strike.

Most Germans expected the Allies would attack at Calais, in France. But they were wrong. Eisenhower planned to strike at the French coast of Normandy, across the English Channel.

The Second World War was then almost five years old. The Germans had won the early battles and gained control of most of Europe. But in nineteen forty-two and forty-three, the Allies slowly began to gain back land from the Germans in northern Africa, Italy, and Russia. And now, finally, the British, American, Canadian, and other Allied forces felt strong enough to attack across the English Channel.

VOICE TWO:

General Dwight Eisenhower speaks to troops before D-Day invasion

Eisenhower had one hundred fifty thousand men, twelve thousand airplanes and many supplies for the attack. But most important, he had surprise on his side. Even after the invasion began, General Erwin Rommel and other top German military experts could not believe that the Allies had really attacked at Normandy.

But attack they did. On the night of June fifth, airplanes dropped thousands of Allied parachute soldiers behind German lines. Then Allied planes began dropping bombs on German defenses. And in the morning, thousands of ships approached the beaches, carrying men and supplies.

VOICE ONE:

Hitting the beach in German-occupied France

The battle quickly became fierce and bloody. The Germans had strong defenses. They were better protected than the Allied troops on the beaches. But the Allied soldiers had greater numbers. Slowly they moved forward on one part of the beach, then another.

VOICE TWO:

The Allies continued to build up their forces in France. They brought nearly ninety thousand vehicles and six-hundred-thousand men into France within one week. And they pushed ahead.

Hitler was furious. He screamed at his generals for not blocking the invasion. And he ordered his troops from nearby areas to join the fight and stop the Allied force. But the Allies would not be stopped.

VOICE ONE:

In late August, the Allied forces captured Paris. The French people cheered wildly as General Charles de Gaulle and free French forces marched into the center of the city.

The Allies then moved east into Belgium. They captured the great Belgian port of Antwerp. This made it easier for them to send supplies and fuel to their troops.

Only when Allied troops tried to move into the Netherlands did the Germans succeed in stopping them. American parachute soldiers won battles at Eindhoven and Njmegen. But German forces defeated British "Red Devil" troops in a terrible fight at Arnhem.

Germany's brief victory stopped the Allied invasion for the moment. But in less than four months, General Eisenhower and the Allied forces had regained almost all of France.

VOICE TWO:

At the same time, in nineteen forty-four, the Soviets were attacking Germany from the east. Earlier, Soviet forces had succeeded in breaking German attacks at Stalingrad [Volgograd], Moscow, and Leningrad [St. Petersburg]. Soviet forces recaptured Russian cities and farms one by one. They entered Finland, Poland, and Romania. By the end of July, Soviet soldiers were just fifteen kilometers from the Polish capital, Warsaw.

VOICE ONE:

What happened next was one of the most terrible events of the war. Moscow radio called on the people of Poland to rise up against the German occupation forces. Nearly forty thousand men in the Polish underground army listened to the call. And they attacked the Germans. The citizens of Warsaw probably could have defeated the German occupation forces if the Soviet army had helped them.

But Soviet leader Josef Stalin betrayed the Poles. He knew that many members of the Polish underground forces opposed communism as much as they opposed the Germans. He feared they would block his efforts to establish a new Polish government that was friendly to Moscow.

For this reason, Stalin held his forces outside Warsaw. He waited while the Germans and Poles killed each other in great numbers. The Germans finally forced the citizens of Warsaw to surrender.

The real winner of the battle, however, was the Soviet Union. Both the Germans and the Poles suffered terrible losses during the fighting. The Soviet Army had little trouble taking over the city with the help of Polish Communists. And after the war, the free Polish forces were too weak to oppose a Communist government loyal to Moscow.

VOICE TWO:

Adolf Hitler was in serious trouble. Allied forces were attacking from the west. Soviet troops were passing through Poland and moving in from the east. And at home, several German military officials tried to assassinate him. The German leader narrowly escaped death when a bomb exploded in a meeting room.

But Hitler refused to surrender. Instead, he planned a surprise attack in December nineteen forty-four. He ordered his forces to move quietly through the Ardennes Forest and attack the center of the Allied line. He hoped to break through the line, separate the Allied forces, and regain control of the war.

VOICE ONE:

The Germans attacked American troops tired from recent fighting in another battle. It was winter. The weather was so bad that Allied planes could not drop bombs on the German forces. The Germans quickly broke through the American line.

But the German success did not last long. Allied forces from nearby areas raced to the battle-front to help. And good weather allowed Allied planes to begin attacking the Germans.

The battle ended by the middle of the following month in a great defeat for Hitler and the Germans. The German army lost more than one hundred thousand men and great amounts of supplies.

VOICE TWO:

The end of the war in Europe was now in sight. By late February, nineteen forty-five, the Germans were forced to retreat across the Rhine River. American forces led by General Patton drove deep into the German heartland.

To the east, Soviet forces also were marching into Germany. It did not take long for the American and Soviet forces to meet in victory. The war in Europe was ended.

VOICE ONE:

General Alfred Jodl signs surrender terms for Germany

Adolf Hitler waited until Russian troops were destroying Berlin. Bombs and shells were falling everywhere. Hitler took his own life by shooting himself in the head.

One week later, the German army surrendered officially to Eisenhower and the allies.

VOICE TWO:

The defeat of Germany was cause for great celebration in Britain, the United States, and other Allied nations. But two facts made the celebrations less joyful than they might have been.

One was the discovery by Allied troops of the terrible German death camps. Only at the end of the war did most of the world learn that the Nazis had murdered millions of innocent Jews and other people.

The second fact was that the Pacific war had not ended. Japanese and American forces were still fighting bitterly. That war in the Pacific will be our story next week.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

You have been listening to THE MAKING OF A NATION, a program in Special English by the Voice of America. Your narrators have been Harry Monroe and Jack Weitzel. Our program was written by David Jarmul.

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