Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Ferrier, Kathleen

(Encyclopedia)Ferrier, Kathleen, 1912–53, British contralto, b. Higher Walton, Lancashire. Ferrier began voice lessons at 25. She became known for her rich, expressive, and remarkably low voice. Her celebrated pe...

Rusk, Jeremiah McLain

(Encyclopedia)Rusk, Jeremiah McLain, 1830–93, American political leader, b. Malta, Ohio. He became a farmer in Wisconsin, where he entered politics and held numerous offices. After serving in the Civil War, he wa...

holiday

(Encyclopedia)holiday [altered from holy day], day set aside for the commemoration of an important event. Holidays are often accompanied by public ceremonies, such as parades and carnivals, and by religious observa...

Roberts, Kenneth Lewis

(Encyclopedia)Roberts, Kenneth Lewis, 1885–1957, American author, b. Kennebunk, Maine, grad. Cornell, 1908. Well known as staff correspondent for the Saturday Evening Post and as an author of travel books, Robert...

miniature painting

(Encyclopedia)miniature painting [Ital.,=artwork, especially manuscript initial letters, done with the red lead pigment minium; the word originally had no implication as to size]. In a general sense the term denote...

Memphis, city, United States

(Encyclopedia)Memphis mĕmˈfĭs [key], city (1990 pop. 610,337), seat of Shelby co., SW Tenn., on the Fourth, or Lower, Chickasaw Bluff above the Mississippi, at the mouth of the Wolf River; inc. 1826. A river por...

Green, Julian

(Encyclopedia)Green, Julian or Julien, 1900–1998, French writer, b. Paris, of American parentage. Except for the years from 1918 to 1922 and from 1940 to 1945, Green lived in France. His 18 novels, written in Fre...

Jackson, Ketanji Onyika Brown

(Encyclopedia)Jackson, Ketanji Onyika Brown, American lawyer, jurist, and Supreme Court Justice, b. Washington, D.C., 1970; grad. Harvard-Radcliff (B.A., cum laud...

Roethke, Theodore

(Encyclopedia)Roethke, Theodore rĕtˈkə [key], 1908–63, American poet, b. Saginaw, Mich., educated at the Univ. of Michigan and Harvard. A poet of the Midwest, Roethke combined a love of the land with his visio...

Watson, Thomas John

(Encyclopedia)Watson, Thomas John, 1874–1956, American industrialist and philanthropist, b. Campbell, N.Y. After rising from clerk to sales executive in the National Cash Register Co. (1898–1913), he became (19...