IN: Born in 1921 on the south side of Chicago, Illinois, Shepherd briefly lived in East Chicago, Indiana, and was raised in Hammond, Indiana, where he graduated from Hammond High School in 1939. The movie A Christmas Story is loosely based on his days growing up in Hammond's southeast side neighborhood of Hessville. As a youth he worked briefly as a mail carrier in a steel mill and earned his Amateur radio license (W9QWN) at age 16, sometimes claiming he was even younger. He sporadically attended Indiana University, but never graduated.

Early in his career, Shepherd had a television program on WLW-TV in Cincinnati called Rear Bumper. He claimed that he was recommended to replace the resigning Steve Allen on NBC's Tonight Show. Shepherd was reportedly brought to New York City by NBC executives to prepare for the position, but they were contractually bound to first offer it to Jack Paar. The network was certain Paar would hold out for a role in prime time, but he accepted the late-night assignment. However, he did not assume the position permanently until Shepherd and Ernie Kovacs had co-hosted the show.  In late 1960 and early 1961, he did a weekly television show on WOR (channel 9) in New York, but it did not last long. Between 1971 and 1994, Shepherd became a screenwriter of note, writing and producing numerous works for both television and cinema, all based on his originally spoken and written stories. He was the writer and narrator of the show Jean Shepherd's America, produced by Boston Public Television station WGBH for PBS, in which he visited various American locales, and interviewed local people of interest. He used a somewhat similar format for the New Jersey Network TV show Shepherd's Pie. On many of the Public TV shows he wrote, directed and edited entire shows.  He also wrote and narrated many works, the most famous being the 1983 MGM feature film A Christmas Story, which is now considered a holiday classic. Shepherd narrates the film as the adult Ralph Parker, and also has a cameo role playing a man in line at the department store waiting for Santa Claus.  Ten years later, Shepherd and A Christmas Story director Bob Clark returned to the same working-class Cleveland street neighborhood to film a sequel, It Runs in the Family (later known as My Summer Story), released by MGM in 1994 and featuring an almost entirely different cast from the previous film.  PBS aired several television movies based on Shepherd stories, also featuring the Parker family. These included The Phantom of the Open Hearth (1976), which aired as part of the anthology series Visions; The Great American Fourth of July and Other Disasters (1982) and The Star-Crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski (1985), both as part of the anthology series American Playhouse; and Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss (1988), a co-production with The Disney Channel. All were narrated by Shepherd but otherwise featured different casts.

What books did he write?

OUT: A Christmas Story,


IN: Ziaur Rahman, popularly known as Zia, was the second son of Mansur Rahman and Jahanara Khatun. His father was a chemist who specialised in paper and ink chemistry and worked for a government department at Writer's Building in Kolkata. As a child Ziaur Rahman, nicknamed Komol, was reserved, shy, quietly spoken, and intense in many respects. He was raised in Bagbari village, Bogra and studied in Bogra Zilla School.

Ziaur Rahman became the 7th President of Bangladesh on 21 April 1977. Years of disorder from the previous political administration of the Awami League and BAKSAL had left most of Bangladesh's state institutions in disarray, with constant internal and external threats. Assuming full control of the state, Zia lifted martial law and introduced massive reforms for the development of the country.  In late September 1977, a group of Japanese Red Army terrorists hijacked an aeroplane and forced it to land in Dhaka. On 30 September, while the attention of the government was riveted on this event, a mutiny broke out in Bogra. Although the mutiny was quickly quelled on the night of 2 October, a second mutiny started in Dhaka, led by disgruntled airmen of Bangladesh Air Force (BAF). The mutineers unsuccessfully attacked Zia's residence, captured Dhaka Radio for a short time and killed a good number of air force officers and airmen at Tejgaon International Airport, where they were gathered for negotiations with the hijackers. Wing Commander M. Hamidullah Khan BP (Sector Commander Bangladesh Defence Forces Sector 11), then BAF Ground Defence Commander, quickly put down the rebellion within the Air Force, but the government was severely shaken. Chief of Air Staff AVM AG Mahmud reappointed Wing Commander Hamidullah as Provost Marshal of BAF. Government intelligence had failed and Zia promptly dismissed the DGFI chief, AVM Aminul Islam Khan BAF, of 9th GD(P) formerly of PAF, and also the DG-NSI. In the aftermath at least 200 soldiers involved in the coup attempt were executed following a secret trial, prompting some critics to call Zia "ruthless".  The size of Bangladesh police forces was doubled and the number of soldiers of the army increased from 50,000 to 90,000. In 1978 he appointed Hussain Muhammad Ershad as the new Chief of Army Staff, promoting him to the rank of Lieutenant General. He was viewed as a professional soldier with no political aspirations (because of his imprisonment in former West Pakistan during the Bangladesh War of Independence) who possessed a soft corner for India. Quietly Ershad rose to become Zia's close politico-military counsellor. In 1981 he brought back Mujib's daughter Hasina Wazed to Bangladesh.

What was one of his reforms?

OUT:
The size of Bangladesh police forces was doubled and the number of soldiers of the army increased from 50,000 to 90,000.