
     Northammon was originally settled in 95 by colonists from Massilia and
     Delphi sectors.  At first, Northammon seemed to be a cold mountainous
     wasteland, an unforgiving environment for hopeful settlers.  The
     planet's distance from its dim star, Kalighril (Northammon lies one
     orbit outside the "habitable zone" of the system) has little
     deleterious effect on the planet's meteorological activity.  A high
     incidence of moderate solar flares and Northammon's high atmospheric
     pressure combine to produce a virtual maelstrom of constant
     meteorological activity.  Swirling coriolises of clouds fill the
     northern and southern hemispheres throughout the year.  Northammon's
     hemispherical regions are snow-covered almost year round with a slight
     reprieve during the "warm season."  The warm season occurs for a
     period of about three weeks at the perigee of Northammon's orbital
     eccentricity around Kalighril.

     In sharp contrast to the frozen northern and southern hemispheres, the
     equatorial region, or "hot belt" as it's known to locals, provides a
     warmer, more moderate clime, with its rolling hills and river valleys.
     A scarcity of large bodies of water throughout 80 percent of the
     planet's 2,000 km-wide tropical zone bolsters the more stable weather
     patterns of the region.  Six large mountain ranges, skirting the edges
     of four of the planet's six tectonic plates, serve as barriers to some
     of Northammon's harsher blizzards.  The numerous faultlines between
     the plates result in a high incidence of seismic activity in the
     region.

     The first Northammonese colony, which discovered, catalogued and began
     to exploit the rich resources of the planet, nearly died out in the
     late 100s.  Colonial overextension strained several supply lines
     through the interstellar region during this period and several
     colonies were left to their own devices for decades.  The colonial
     population of the planet, which had risen to 20,000, fell to under
     8,000 people.  A scarcity of supplies resulted in an exodus from the
     planet to the more stable environments of Isurkun, Achemadon and Kauai
     systems.  The hardy bunch who remained played a defining role in
     establishing the culture of Northammon.

     The Northammonese settlers who remained and the trickle of daring
     colonists who continued to settle the planet, developed a strong
     self-reliance ethic that remains to this day.  The Northammonese
     welcomed new settlers and continued to settle their world regardless
     of the public sentiment against it.  Seemingly trying to prove their
     detractors wrong, the Northammonese settlers went far and wide
     throughout the sphere of their world, establishing farms and ranches
     even in the most inclement regions.  While 65 percent of the early
     Northammonese clung to the tropical zone, thousands of bold souls
     plowed into the outback and staked their claims in the northern and
     southern plateaus and mountain ranges.

     Northammonite Frontier, the planetary colonial development office,
     maintained its aggressive colonial recruitment policy all the while.
     Throughout the early colonial period of the planet, Northammonite
     Frontier colonial recruiters could be found on any world within six
     parsecs, actively encouraging people to come and share the wealth of
     their rich and undeveloped planet.

     Not until the late 300s did colonial efforts on Northammon surpass
     their former level, however.  In 397, ex-scout and entrepreneur Lewis
     Tolliver discovered records of Northammon's rich natural resources at
     the Imperial Archives on Vincennes.  He registered a claim with
     Northammonite Frontier and mounted a massive colonial expedition to
     bolster the extant colonies.  Before anyone knew it, Northammon was a
     virtual boomtown.

     Tolliver's expedition, largely composed of detached duty scouts,
     quickly performed detailed surveys of the planet's resources.  To
     their surprise, the planet was rich in vegetative life, with over 600
     edible plant species.  The Tolliver group and successors quickly
     helped to establish agricultural combines to exploit the lush
     Northammonese crops.  While most of planet species grow in the
     temperate tropical region, astoundingly high numbers of crops are
     exported from the northern and southern hemispheres.  The edible
     lichens and fruits of the southern region are known as a delicacy by
     people throughout Northammon's interstellar community.

     As a side note, Tolliver's expedition is well known for its
     importation of Kians from Prilissa/Trin's Veil.  Several hundred Kians
     were brought to Northammon to be used as cheap transportation by
     Tolliver's colonists.  Kians continue to be widely used for
     transporation in rural areas of the planet and in cities and towns on
     the racing circuit.  In fact, while Tolliver's agricultural businesses
     eventually failed, his Kian breeding facility and Tolliver Grounds, a
     Kian racetrack, are his sole remaining legacies on Northammon.
     Northammonese Kians are thought to number over 300,000 at the present
     date.

     Like many of the systems in the Vincennes Cluster, Northammon's
     indigenous life for the most part resembles that of Cambrian-era
     Terra.  Most notable among Northammon's native life forms are the
     lichens and shrubs of the northern and southern tundra.  Bursting
     through the volcanic soil of the mountains and plains, these life
     forms have shown uncommon resiliency.  For centuries, monastic orders
     of Deneb's Church of the Stellar Divinity have lauded the medicinal
     properties of several species of Northammonese mountain shrub roots.
     Not until the last 200 years, however, have these claims been taken
     seriously by the public at large.

     By 800, the Northammonese population had grown to over four million
     inhabitants.  Their cultural emphasis on self-reliance spawned several
     government-subsidized programs to independently develop technology on
     the planet.  To this end, the former representative democracy of the
     planet began to import materials for the production of starships,
     vehicles and computers.  The industrial sector began to grow, but was
     mostly restricted to serving the needs of agricultural interests.

     As the limited agricultural markets began to tap out for Northammon's
     private industries, tension began to grow with the landlords of the
     agricultural combines.  Nara Tandy, president of Circumspect Inc., a
     producer of advanced land and gravitic vehicles, lobbied for rights to
     manufacture products for export to other worlds.  Most controversial
     of her requests was an initiative that would bring in megacorporate
     investment, a heretofore unseen occurrence on Northammon.
     Agricultural interests onplanet greatly feared the portents of such a
     bold move and lobbied hard against it.  Fear of overdevelopment,
     atmospheric contamination and offworld control by big industry
     abounded in agricultural circles.

     The combines were able to stave off offworld industrial development
     until 962.  At this time, various factors contributed to a worldwide
     depression that threatened to unhinge the infrastructure of the
     planet's economy.  Tandy seized her opportunity and managed to corral
     a hysterical electorate into believing that now was the time for
     offworld investment.  Tandy brought in a consortium, led by
     representatives of Ling Standard Products and Sternmental Horizons
     Venture Capital division, who would revitalize the economy of the
     planet.

     For a half century, that's exactly what they did.  Northammon's
     economy grew and as the planet's ability to export technology grew, so
     did its ability to export its agricultural products.  Agricultural
     exports grew to the point that the "Northammon Grown" cargo module
     stamp became ubiquitous on every inhabited system within 12 parsecs.
     Megacorporate and sectorwide corporate developers flocked to
     Northammon to get a piece of the pie.  The political strength of the
     combines waned during the following years to the point that public
     resentment for the megacorporations grew to a fever pitch.  The
     conflict reached its climax when six anti-megacorporate development
     militias (called "terrorists" by the megacorporate-sponsored media)
     attacked dozens of industrial installations in a concerted effort to
     derail their operations.  Corporate security teams and offworld
     mercenaries took up arms against the militias, but found it difficult
     to fight the guerilla-style militia troops, who knew the nooks and
     crannies of Northammon's mountain ranges and valleys.

     As the conflict escalated over the following four years, the dependent
     local markets sent up a cry to the Imperial Navy to intervene.  And
     intervene they did.  Already fighting the Zhodani and Outworld
     Coalition on their spinward front in a series of border wars that
     later became known as the Fourth Frontier War, the Imperium did not
     want to foster the notion that internecine warfare existed throughout
     the Spinward Marches and Deneb.  Four peacekeeping divisions of
     marines were dispatched to quell the unrest.  While skirmishes
     continued to occur at more remote locations, for the most part, the
     TL-15 armed marines were able to quash the fighting.

     In an effort to preserve the peace, the Imperium removed the
     corporate-dominated government of Northammon and placed moderate
     pro-combine General Paul Javinovich, from the ranks of Northammon's
     standing army, as the planetary dictator.  The Imperial Marines were
     promptly removed and indigenous army divisions took their place.
     While the military rule of Javinovich and his successors has kept the
     peace, the seething hatred between the agricultural and corporate
     interests has never been fully extricated from the planetary
     citizenry.

     Despite Northammon's problems, the planet remains a major economic
     force in the region with its powerful agricultural sector and active
     vehicle-building industries.  Most worlds in Vincennes, Star Lane and
     Inar subsectors actively import delectable Northammonese foods.
     Northammonese industry is known to produce some of the most efficient
     and dependable farming vehicles in the Regency.  R&D divisions are
     currently expanding into military and commercial markets as well.  The
     Circumspect Starhawk enclosed grav cycle is currently making waves in
     the civilian gravitic vehicle industry.  Achieving early TL-13 in many
     areas, Northammon is truly on the cutting edge of vehicular design.

     The native population of Northammon are about 95 percent vegetarian.
     Because of the planet's lack of non-vegetative life forms and the
     intrinsic self-reliance of its people, few meat products from other
     worlds were imported during the early colonial years.  The diversity
     of agricultural life on the planet made it possible to meet the
     population's nutritional requirements without the need for imported
     foods.  This aversion to imported food products became part of the
     culture.  With few exceptions, the only Northammonese meat eaters on
     the planet are the megacorporate employees.

     Northammon has only three major cities, Tergin (pop. 2 million),
     Gebhardt (pop. 800,000) and the capital, Metro-Javinovich (pop.
     350,000).  Only Tergin and Metro-Javinovich contain Starport B
     facilities.  Gebhardt currently maintains a Spaceport F-quality
     installation.  A small orbital level C facility, Northammon Orbital
     Starport (pop. 12,000) serves the needs of transient travellers who
     use the system only as a stopover.  The planetbound cities are all
     located in the tropical region and for the most part serve
     megacorporate interests.  Most of the combines have offices in the
     cities as well, however, that serve as the conduits through which they
     conduct interstellar trade.  The remainder of the population,
     including over 13 million Northammonese, are spread out over the
     globe, living and working on the combines and independent ranches.
     Small cities and towns are the unofficial rule in the agricultural
     regions, with only a few of them surpassing 100,000 in population.

     Northammon is one of the few worlds in the Regency that serve the
     purpose of harboring refugees from the far-flung Two Thousand Worlds.
     When the Rebellion struck and vargr raiders swept through Corridor and
     trailing Deneb sector, many visiting traders, diplomats and merchants
     were cut off from their homes in trailing and rimward sectors.
     Several large communities of k'kree were among these disenfranchised
     sentients.

     The Beng!xkr and Kr'ukleeri!iir herds, members of the k'kree trading
     organization, Rr!krmiixk, were among the larger cohesive groups to be
     stranded far from home.  While the Beng!xkr and Kr'ukleeri!iir were
     spread around the Domain of Deneb conducting trade operations, after
     the Rebellion hit, they soon realized they would not be returning home
     at any time in the near future.  Their trade mission completed, the
     wayward k'kree had nowhere to go.

     As one of General Javinovich's last acts in office before he died in
     1121, he sold the Rr!krmiixk merchants a large tract of undeveloped
     land in Northammon's tropical region.  Northammon, which fits the
     parameters of a k'kree "steppeworld," was an ideal site for the
     refugee k'kree to set down their roots.  The rather exhorbitant price
     paid by the k'kree for their land included the provision that the
     k'kree were to be left to their own devices and not bothered by smelly
     omnivorous humans.

     Many vegetarian Northammonese natives maintain regular contact with
     the k'kree, but there is no communal mixing of k'kree and human
     populations.  The limited trade between humans and k'kree enable the
     k'kree to maintain TL-9 for public transportation and other services
     in their community and for maintenance of their trader fleet.

     The sale of this land to the k'kree was heavily disputed by
     megacorporate interests.  They were appalled at the unabashed efforts
     of the vegetarian combines to use any means possible to make
     Northammon a less hospitable environment for the corporations and
     their employees.  The hostility of the k'kree toward carnivorous races
     was an established fact.  To combat this move, many corporations
     embarked upon aggressive, albeit shortlived, programs to enforce
     vegetarian diets among their employees.  Suffice it to say that for
     the brief life of these programs, the corporations experienced a
     considerable turnover rate among their largely offworld work forces.

     The initial settlement numbered over 12,000 k'kree, who had emigrated
     to Northammon from various locations throughout the Domain.  Several
     smaller families, realizing they had little hope of ever returning
     home to the Two Thousand Worlds, chose to relocate to Northammon as
     well, with the blessing of the Beng!xkr and Kr'ukleeri!iir herds.
     Northammon became a haven for stranded k'kree.

     Upon the discovery by a SuSAG research team in 1145 that some species
     of Northammon's equatorial flora had valuable pharmaceutical
     properties, the company established a research lab at the fringes of
     the k'kree reservation.  This was not looked well upon by the reigning
     Steppelord, Kurr'eengx, who immediately made a call to arms to his
     brethren.  In a move that could only be called reactionary, Kurr'eengx
     and his troops swept into the Divigee Valley, where SuSAG had
     constructed a makeshift headquarters, and promptly massacred the
     humans at the facility.  SuSAG, known for its paranoia, had two
     companies of TL-15 equipped security personnel on-site, but the
     surprise attack caught them offguard.  The k'kree took heavy losses in
     the battle, with some estimates at over 2,500 dead.  Nevertheless,
     they managed to communicate a dire message to any who would threaten
     the sovereignty of their reservation.

     SuSAG appealed to the Regency government for reparations, but was
     denied.  The Northammonese megacorporate sector did not react well to
     this development.  While the k'kree were looked upon as an oddity for
     the first two decades of their stay on Northammon, they were now
     looked upon as a threat.  Armed militia bands were formed by the
     megacorporations, with the intention of settling the region adjacent
     to the k'kree reservation and daring the k'kree to challenge human
     sovereignty on the planet.

     Things began to heat up, with several skirmishes occurring on the
     borders of the k'kree settlement.  The combine-dominated Northammonese
     army refused to intervene on the side of the corporations.  Extreme
     factions of the Northammonese army began to make a call to arms to
     "aid their k'kree brothers against the corporate oppressors."  Duke
     Norris himself sent two divisions of Regency Marines to keep the
     conflict from escalating into civil war.  This was the second time
     that divisions of marines had been sent to preserve peace on
     Northammon.

     The divisions were drawn from the marine training camp at Burden, one
     of Northammon's two moons.  Forming a loose cordon around the k'kree
     reservation, the marines have successfully deterred all hostile
     actions by the megacorporations against the k'kree.  The marine
     garrison remains to this day to ensure the safety of the k'kree
     settlement.

     While the k'kree population has swelled to over 640,000 in the
     following 75 years, the k'kree enclave on Northammon makes up less
     than four percent of the total planetary population.

     The divisiveness between industrialists and agriculturists has
     continued into the 1200s.  While muted hatred continues to seethe
     between the two groups, the presence of not one but two military rule
     garrisons keeps the peace.  The k'kree are a reluctant ally of the
     combines, but are suspicious that they are being played as pawns by
     their benefactors.  Because of Northammon's importance to the region,
     it is vital that this situation doesn't erupt into fullscale war.

