Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

158 results found

Niebuhr, Reinhold

(Encyclopedia)Niebuhr, Reinhold rīnˈhōld nēˈbo͝or [key], 1892–1971, American religious and social thinker, b. Wright City, Mo. A graduate of Yale Divinity School, he served (1915–28) as pastor of Bethel E...

Kosciusko, Thaddeus

(Encyclopedia)Kosciusko or Kosciuszko, Thaddeus kŏsˌēŭsˈkō [key], Pol. Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Košciuszko, 1746–1817, Polish general. Trained in military academies in Warsaw and Paris, he offered his s...

Wiseman, Frederick

(Encyclopedia)Wiseman, Frederick, 1930–, American documentary filmmaker, b. Boston, grad. Williams College (B.A., 1951), Yale Law School (LL.B., 1954). Wiseman practiced and taught law for about a decade, but his...

Wyler, William

(Encyclopedia)Wyler, William, 1902–1981, American film director, producer, and writer, b. Mülhausen, Germany (now Mulhouse, France) as Willi Wilder. He came to the United States (1920) at the invitation of Carl ...

bookbinding

(Encyclopedia)bookbinding. The art and business of bookbinding began with the protection of parchment manuscripts with boards. Papyrus had originally been produced in rolls, but sheets of parchment came to be folde...

orientation

(Encyclopedia)orientation, in architecture, the disposition of the parts of a building with reference to the points of the compass. From remote antiquity the traditional belief in the efficacy of religious ceremoni...

Harlem

(Encyclopedia)Harlem, residential and business section of upper Manhattan, New York City, bounded roughly by 110th St., the East River and Harlem River, 168th St., Amsterdam Ave., and Morningside Park. The Dutch se...

Olivier, Laurence Kerr, Baron Olivier of Brighton

(Encyclopedia)Olivier, Laurence Kerr, Baron Olivier of Brighton ōlĭvˈē-āˌ [key], 1907–89, English actor, director, and producer. He made his stage debut at Stratford-upon-Avon in 1922 and soon achieved reno...

Bunker Hill, battle of

(Encyclopedia)Bunker Hill, battle of, in the American Revolution, June 17, 1775. Detachments of colonial militia under Artemas Ward, Nathanael Greene, John Stark, and Israel Putnam laid siege to Boston shortly afte...

Chancellorsville, battle of

(Encyclopedia)Chancellorsville, battle of, May 2–4, 1863, in the American Civil War. Late in Apr., 1863, Joseph Hooker, commanding the Union Army of the Potomac, moved against Robert E. Lee, whose Army of Norther...

Browse by Subject