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Borg, Björn

(Encyclopedia)Borg, Björn byörn bôrg, bôrˈyə [key], 1956–, Swedish tennis player. As a teenage star he led (1975) Sweden to its first Davis Cup victory. One of the most successful modern tennis players, Bor...

Still, William Grant

(Encyclopedia)Still, William Grant, 1895–1978, American composer, b. Woodville, Miss. Still was of Native American, African-American, and European ancestry. He studied music at Oberlin, with Chadwick at the New E...

Thomson, Peter William

(Encyclopedia)Thomson, Peter William, 1929–2018, Australian golfer. A leading player in European tournaments at a time when Australians had not yet emerged as top golfers, Thomson had a compact swing and efficien...

Oppian

(Encyclopedia)Oppian ŏpˈēən [key], fl. 2d cent., Greek poet. He is the author of a didactic poem (in five books of hexameters) on fishing called Halieutica. Two other poems, formerly attributed to Oppian, are n...

vespers

(Encyclopedia)vespers vĕsˈpərz [key] [Lat.,=evening], in the Christian Church, principal evening office. In the Roman rite, vespers have consisted since the 6th cent. of a few prayers, five psalms, a lesson, the...

Vitim

(Encyclopedia)Vitim vētyēmˈ [key], river, c.1,140 mi (1,830 km) long, rising in the Transbaykalian Mts., E Siberian Russia, in the Buryat Republic, and flowing S, NE, then N into the Lena River at Vitim. It is n...

Aldrovandi, Ulisse

(Encyclopedia)Aldrovandi, Ulisse o͞olēsˈsā äldrōvänˈdē [key], 1522–1605, Italian naturalist, professor at the Univ. of Bologna. He instigated the establishment (1567) of the Bologna Botanical Garden and ...

Hemans, Felicia Dorothea (Browne)

(Encyclopedia)Hemans, Felicia Dorothea (Browne) hĕmˈənz [key], 1793–1835, English poet. She married Capt. Alfred Hemans in 1812, had five children, and separated from him in 1818. Although she wrote much mild ...

Jackson, Reggie

(Encyclopedia)Jackson, Reggie (Reginald Martinez Jackson), 1946–, American baseball player, b. Wyncote, Pa. In 21 years in the American League, most notably with the Oakland Athletics and New York Yankees, he hit...

Mysuru

(Encyclopedia)Mysuru, formerly Mysore mīsôrˈ [key], city (2011 provisional pop. 887,446), Karnataka state, S India. Mysore is an industrial, commercial, and educational center whose products include silk saris, ...