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walnut

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Black walnut, Juglans nigra walnut, common name for some members of the Juglandaceae, a family of chiefly deciduous, resinous trees characterized by large and aromatic compound leaves. Species...

hogback

(Encyclopedia)hogback, sharp-crested ridge with steep slopes on both sides, formed by the erosion of steeply tilted rock layers. Hogbacks are commonly formed along the eroded flanks of large, tightly folded anticli...

cowpea

(Encyclopedia)cowpea, black-eyed pea, or black-eyed bean, annual legume (Vigna sinensis) of the pulse family. Introduced in the early 18th cent. from the Old World to the S United States, it has become a staple of...

Cullen, Countee

(Encyclopedia)Cullen, Countee kounˈtēˈ [key], 1903–46, American poet, b. New York City, grad. New York Univ. 1925, M.A. Harvard, 1926. A major writer of the Harlem Renaissance—a flowering of black artistic a...

Elion, Gertrude Belle

(Encyclopedia)Elion, Gertrude Belle ĕlˈēən [key], 1918–99, American pharmacologist, b. New York City, B.S. Hunter College, 1937. Unable to find research work (largely because she was a woman), she taught high...

Abrahams, Peter

(Encyclopedia)Abrahams, Peter, 1919–2017, South African novelist and journalist, b. Peter Henry Abrahams Deras. Though he lived mostly in exile, he exposed the injustices of the apartheid system and the politics ...

Chandrasekhar, Subrahmanyan

(Encyclopedia)Chandrasekhar, Subrahmanyan so͝obˌrəmänˈyən chŭnˌdrəsāˈkər [key], 1910–95, American astrophysicist, b. Lahore, India (now Pakistan). He became a professor at the Univ. of Chicago in 1938...

rosewood

(Encyclopedia)rosewood, popular name for the ornamental wood of several species of tropical trees, especially for the heartwood of certain leguminous trees of the genus Dalbergia of the family Leguminosae (pulse fa...

onager

(Encyclopedia)onager ŏnˈəjər [key] or Persian wild ass, wild ass of central Asia, Equus hemonius onager. Formerly classified as a separate species, it is one of the several subspecies of Asian wild ass (E. hemo...

Wright, Richard

(Encyclopedia)Wright, Richard, 1908–60, American author. An African American born on a Mississippi plantation, Wright struggled through a difficult childhood and worked to educate himself. He moved to Chicago in ...