Allan J. Pinkerton was a Scottish-American cooper, abolitionist, detective, and spy, best known for creating the Pinkerton National Detective Agency in the United States and his claim to have foiled a plot in 1861 to assassinate president-elect Abraham Lincoln. During the Civil War, he provided the Union Army – specifically General George B. McClellan of the Army of the Potomac – with military intelligence, including extremely inaccurate enemy troop strength numbers. After the war, his agents played a significant role as strikebreakers – in particular during the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 – a role that Pinkerton men would continue to play after the death of their founder.
Sharon is a given name as well as an Israeli surname.
Victoria Davey Spelling is an American actress and author. Her first major role was Donna Martin on Beverly Hills, 90210, beginning in 1990. She has appeared in made for television films, including A Friend to Die For (1994), A Carol Christmas (2003), The Mistle-Tones (2012), both versions of Mother, May I Sleep with Danger? and The Last Sharknado: It's About Time (2018). She has also starred in several independent films including The House of Yes (1997), Trick (1999), Scary Movie 2 (2001), Cthulhu (2007), Kiss the Bride (2007) and Izzie's Way Home (2016). She reprised her role of Donna Martin in Beverly Hills, 90210's spin-off, BH90210, in 2019.
George Brinton McClellan was an American military officer, politician, engineer, businessman and writer who served as the 24th governor of New Jersey. A West Point graduate, McClellan served with distinction during the Mexican–American War before leaving the United States Army to serve as an railway executive and engineer until the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861. Early in the conflict, McClellan was appointed to the rank of major general and played an important role in raising the Army of the Potomac, which served in the Eastern Theater; he also served as Commanding General of the United States Army from November 1861 to March 1862.
Louis Sachar is an American young-adult mystery-comedy author. He is best known for the Wayside School series and the novel Holes.
Scott McClellan is the former White House Press Secretary (2003–06) for President George W. Bush, he was the 24th person to hold this post. He was also the author of a controversial No. 1 New York Times bestseller about the Bush Administration titled What Happened. He replaced Ari Fleischer as press secretary in July 2003 and served until May 10, 2006. McClellan was the longest serving press secretary under George W. Bush.
Robert Ira Wexler is an American politician and lawyer from Florida. He is the president of the Washington-based S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace. Wexler was a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives, representing Florida's 19th congressional district, from 1997 until his resignation on January 3, 2010.
Daniel Joseph Bartlett is an American political advisor who served as counselor to the president and communications director in the administration of George W. Bush.
Mills & Boon is a romance imprint of British publisher Harlequin UK Ltd. It was founded in 1908 by Gerald Rusgrove Mills and Charles Boon as a general publisher. The company moved towards escapist fiction for women in the 1930s. In 1971, the publisher was bought by the Canadian company Harlequin Enterprises, its North American distributor based in Toronto, with whom it had a long informal partnership. The two companies offer a number of imprints that between them account for almost three-quarters of the romance paperbacks published in Britain. Its print books are presently out-numbered and out-sold by the company's e-books, which allowed the publisher to double its output.
Nora Roberts is an American author of over 225 romance novels. She writes as J. D. Robb,Jill March and Sarah Hardesty.
First Avenue & 7th St Entry are two historic music venues housed in the same landmark building in downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota. The nightclub sits on the corner of First Avenue North and 7th Street North, from which the venues get their names. The two are colloquially distinguished by locals as The Mainroom and The Entry.
Adam Gregory is a Canadian country music singer-songwriter and actor. Active since 2000, he has recorded four studio albums to date, including The Way I'm Made (2000) and Workin' on It (2002), both on Epic Records, and a self-titled album in 2006 on Mensa Records. He has charted several singles on the Canadian country music charts, including two singles which were also Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in the United States. In 2010, Gregory starred in WWJD, a film-based on In His Steps by Charles Sheldon.
Athena Force is a series of adventure novels about graduates of the Athena Academy, an elite school for girls with special talents, as they combat kidnappers, terrorists, and the forces of evil. Published under the Silhouette Bombshell imprint, the first continuity of novels dealt with a group of friends who all graduated from the Athena Academy—each had her special gift or skill, and each had her own adventure. One of the elements that related them was the mysterious death of one of their classmates. The second continuity told a different, less-connected story using the same background but new characters. For the third continuity, the series moved to Silhouette Special Releases after the Bombshell imprint was shut down by Harlequin Enterprises in January 2007.
The RITA Award was the most prominent award for English-language romance fiction from 1990 to 2019. It was presented by the Romance Writers of America (RWA). The purpose of the RITA Award was to promote excellence in the romance genre by recognizing outstanding published novels and novellas. It was named for the RWA's first president, Rita Clay Estrada. It was not awarded in 2020, and was replaced by the Vivian Award, awarded for the first time in 2021.
Cherry Adair is a South African–American romantic fiction writer. She lives near Seattle, Washington with her husband.
Niobia Bryant is an African-American novelist of both romance and mainstream fiction. She also writes urban fiction as Meesha Mink and young adult fiction as Simone Bryant.
No Min-woo is a South Korean actor, musician, singer and songwriter. He is also known under the stage names ICON and MINUE. He debuted as a drummer in TRAX in 2004, and left the band two years later. In 2008, he began acting in various television series and movies, such as Pasta, My Girlfriend is a Nine-Tailed Fox and Full House Take 2, and he regularly contributes to movie and drama soundtracks. In 2013, No made a comeback as a singer under the stage name ICON. In 2016 he enlisted in the military, and returned in 2018. In 2020, he made a comeback as the lead singer and leader of the newly formed band The Midnight Romance.
Yoon Je-moon is a South Korean actor. He appears in theater, film and television, notably in the movies The Man Next Door (2010) and Dangerously Excited (2012), and the TV series The End of the World (2013).
Mark Whitney Hulsbeck is an American professional aquanaut. He serves as an Oceanographic Operations Field Manager and research diver for the Aquarius Reef Base, the world's only undersea research laboratory, operated by Florida International University. Hulsbeck is nicknamed "Otter".
Sins of Empire is the first book in the flintlock fantasy trilogy Gods of Blood and Powder written by American author Brian McClellan. It was published by Orbit Books in 2017. A sequel titled Wrath of Empire was released on May 15, 2018.
