(Encyclopedia) Handy, W. C. (William Christopher Handy), 1873–1958, American songwriter and band leader, b. Florence, Ala. Largely self-taught, Handy began his career as a cornet player in a minstrel…
(Encyclopedia) Griffith, D. W. (David Llewelyn Wark Griffith), 1875–1948, American movie director and producer, b. La Grange, Ky. Griffith was the first major American film director. He began his…
(Encyclopedia) Friendly, Fred W., 1915–98, American broadcaster and author, b. New York City as Ferdinand Friendly Wachenheimer. He began his career at age 22 at a radio station in Providence where…
(Encyclopedia) Allport, Gordon W.Allport, Gordon W.ôlˈpôrt [key], 1897–1967, American psychologist, b. Montezuma, Ind. One of the first psychologists to study personality, Allport researched human…
(Encyclopedia) Abel, I. W. (Iorwith Wilbur Abel)Abel, I. W.yôrˈwĭth [key], 1908–87, American labor leader, b. Magnolia, Ohio. In 1925 he went to work in a rolling mill in Canton, Ohio, and was…
(Encyclopedia) Fields, W. C. (William Claude Fields), 1880–1946, American comic actor, b. Philadelphia as Claude William Dukenfield. He began his career as a juggler, and much later appeared in the…
(Encyclopedia) Sebald, W. G. (Winfried Georg Maximilian Sebald), 1944–2001, German novelist, grad. Freiburg Univ. (1965). Sebald's novels are dense, elegiac, and meditative. They mingle fiction with…
(Encyclopedia) Smith, W. Eugene (William Eugene Smith), 1918–78, American photojournalist, b. Wichita, Kan. Smith is considered one of the principal masters of modern photojournalism. The distorted…
(Encyclopedia) Snodgrass, W. D. (William DeWitt Snodgrass), 1926–2009, American poet and translator, b. Wilkinsburg, Pa., grad. Univ. of Iowa, 1959. He is particularly known for his debut book, Heart…
(Encyclopedia) Post, C. W. (Charles William Post), 1854–1914, American food manufacturer and developer of breakfast cereals, b. Springfield, Ill. He worked (1872–86) selling agricultural machines and…