Lewis Allan Reed was an American musician, singer, songwriter and poet. He was the rhythm/lead guitarist, singer and principal songwriter for the rock band The Velvet Underground and had a solo career that spanned five decades. The Velvet Underground was not a commercial success during its existence, but became regarded as one of the most influential bands in the history of underground and alternative rock music.
After leaving the band in 1970, Reed released twenty solo studio albums. His second, Transformer, was produced by David Bowie and arranged by Mick Ronson, and brought mainstream recognition. The album is considered an influential landmark of the glam rock genre, anchored by Reed's most successful single, "Walk on the Wild Side". After Transformer, the less commercial but critically acclaimed Berlin reached No. 7 on the UK Albums Chart. Rock 'n' Roll Animal sold strongly, and Sally Can't Dance peaked at No. 10 on the Billboard 200; but for a long period after, Reed's work did not translate into sales, leading him deeper into drug addiction and alcoholism.
Hans Michael Mark is a former Secretary of the Air Force and a former Deputy Administrator of NASA. He is an expert and consultant in aerospace design and national defense policy. Mark retired from the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at the University of Texas at Austin's Cockrell School of Engineering in July 2014.
The Battle of Midway was a decisive naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II that took place on 4–7 June 1942, six months after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor and one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea. The United States Navy under Admirals Chester W. Nimitz, Frank J. Fletcher, and Raymond A. Spruance defeated an attacking fleet of the Imperial Japanese Navy under Admirals Isoroku Yamamoto, Chūichi Nagumo, and Nobutake Kondō near Midway Atoll, inflicting devastating damage on the Japanese fleet that proved irreparable. Military historian John Keegan called it "the most stunning and decisive blow in the history of naval warfare", while naval historian Craig Symonds called it "one of the most consequential naval engagements in world history, ranking alongside Salamis, Trafalgar, and Tsushima Strait, as both tactically decisive and strategically influential".
The Japanese operation, like the earlier attack on Pearl Harbor, hoped to eliminate the United States as a strategic power in the Pacific, thereby giving Japan a free hand in establishing its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.