Wikipedia:Portal:Portal

This page contains material that is kept because it is considered humorous.
Such material is not meant to be taken seriously.

Wikipedia portal contents page

Portal topics: Activities; Culture; Geography; Health; History; Mathematics; Nature; People; Philosophy; Religion; Society; Technology; Random portal

edit

The portal of portals

A portal is an opening in the walls of a building, gate or fortification, and especially a grand entrance to an important structure. Doors, metal gates or portcullis in the opening can be used to control entry or exit. The surface surrounding the opening may be made of simple building materials or decorated with ornamentation. Elements of a portal can include the voussoir, tympanum, an ornamented mullion or trumeau between doors, and columns with carvings of saints in the westwork of a church.

Portals in science fiction, such as wormholes and gates, allow rapid travel between distant locations, often originating from some combination of natural phenomenon and technological device. These fictional devices are required for most stories on an inter-solar scale, otherwise transit time would be excessive for storytelling purposes. An advantage of portal technology over a faster-than-light drive is that it can be imagined to work instantly, and can travel to the past or future. In other forms of fiction, a portal may be magical, and connect to an alternate universe or plane of existence.

Show new selections below (purge)

edit

Selected article

West Portal is a principal shopping street for much of southwestern San Francisco, California, and is also considered a neighborhood itself. Named for the western terminus of the Muni tunnel beneath Twin Peaks that opened in 1918, the street (West Portal Avenue) and adjacent district is still dominated by the frequent trundlings of the three Muni Metro lines (K, L and M) that emerge from the subway to run in the street median. The ride in the subway from West Portal to downtown/Union Square is about fifteen to twenty minutes.

West Portal lies directly adjacent to several larger San Francisco neighborhoods: the affluent and lushly verdant Forest Hill and St. Francis Wood neighborhoods on the east and south, Parkside (a southern sub-district of the Sunset District) on the north, and at the western end of the Avenue, Lakeshore Village and Merced Manor. The residential areas of the West Portal neighborhood, like several of the adjacent districts, are unusual for San Francisco in that the homes are often detached, albeit with small yards. The frequent fog helps keep the area green in the usually rainless summer months, and on a clear day, the park above the tunnel provides a view of the Marin Headlands and the Farallon Islands in the Pacific.

In addition to the streetcar tunnel, West Portal's landmarks include a large movie theater, a library, a school, churches, several restaurants and bars, a bookstore, markets, coffee shops, a bakery, professional offices, and other shops. Despite the semi-recent appearances of larger chain stores, the many unique neighborhood shops give the area a distinctly smaller-city, "retro" charm. The West Portal Muni Metro Station is located at the entrance to the Muni tunnel at the northern end of West Portal Avenue.

More articles...

edit

Selected biography

Charles Frederick Algernon Portal, 1st Viscount Portal of Hungerford KG GCB OM DSO & Bar MC (21 May 1893 - 22 April 1971) was a senior Royal Air Force officer and an advocate of strategic bombing. He was the British Chief of the Air Staff during most of the Second World War.

Born in Hungerford, Portal was educated at Winchester College and Christ Church, Oxford, but left undergraduate life prematurely to enlist as a private soldier in 1914. Joining the British Army as a dispatch rider in the motorcycle section of the Royal Engineers on the Western Front, he was given command of all riders in the 1st Corps Headquarters Signals Company in December 1914.

In 1915 Portal transferred to the Royal Flying Corps, serving first as an observer and eventually a flying officer. He reached the rank of lieutenant colonel and earned the Military Cross. After the war, he took over No. 7 Squadron RAF and concentrated on improving bombing accuracy. By 1939 Portal was Director of Organization in the Air Ministry.

At the outbreak of World War II, Portal was made Acting Air Marshal and later commander-in-chief of RAF Bomber Command. Winston Churchill was impressed with Portal's strategy of area bombing (which resulted in the Luftwaffe bombing London instead of British airfields) and knighted Portal in July 1940. He was appointed Air Chief Marshal in October 1940, and Marshal of the Royal Air Force in June 1944.

After the war, Portal retired from the RAF and was created Baron Portal of Hungerford (later Viscount Portal). After a 5-year period at the Ministry of Supply, he was elected Chairman of British Aluminium and fought a hostile takeover bid by Sir Ivan Stedeford, Chairman & CEO of Tube Investments. Losing to Stedeford, he was elected chairman of the British Aircraft Corporation in 1960, and died in 1971, aged 77.

More biographies...

edit