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Mission Indians

(Encyclopedia)Mission Indians, Native Americans of S and central California; so called because they were under the jurisdiction of some 21 Spanish missions that were established between 1769 and 1823. The major gro...

praying Indians

(Encyclopedia)praying Indians, name for Native North Americans who accepted Christianity. Although many different groups are called by this name, e.g., the Roman Catholic Iroquois of St. Regis, it was more commonly...

American Indian Movement

(Encyclopedia)American Indian Movement (AIM), Native American civil-rights activist organization, founded in 1968 to encourage self-determination among Native Americans and to establish international re...

Baldwin, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Baldwin, Robert, 1804–58, Canadian statesman, leader of the movement for representative government in Canada, b. York (now Toronto), Ont. His father, William Warren Baldwin (1775–1844), was a lead...

Stowe, Harriet Beecher

(Encyclopedia)Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 1811–96, American novelist and humanitarian, b. Litchfield, Conn. With her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, she stirred the conscience of Americans concerning slavery and thereby inf...

National Recovery Administration

(Encyclopedia)National Recovery Administration (NRA), in U.S. history, administrative bureau established under the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933. In response to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's cong...

isolationism

(Encyclopedia)isolationism, a national policy of abstaining from political, military, or economic alliances or agreements with other countries. Isolationism may be adopted in order to devote a country's energies to...

noise pollution

(Encyclopedia)noise pollution, human-created noise harmful to health or welfare. Transportation vehicles are the worst offenders, with aircraft, railroad stock, trucks, buses, automobiles, and motorcycles all produ...

bison

(Encyclopedia)bison, large hoofed mammal, genus Bison, of the cattle family. Bison have short horns and humped, heavily mantled shoulders that slope downward to the hindquarters. The European bison, or wisent, Biso...

Pratt, Richard Henry

(Encyclopedia)Pratt, Richard Henry, 1840–1924, American soldier and educator, b. Rushford, N.Y. He served in the Union army during the Civil War and then in the Indian wars in the West, where he became interested...