Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Grange, Red

(Encyclopedia)Grange, Red (Harold Edward Grange), 1903–91, American football player, b. Forksville, Pa. Grange was All-America halfback at the Univ. of Illinois (1923–25). After a spectacular college career in ...

five hundred

(Encyclopedia)five hundred, card game, similar in principle to euchre, usually played by three persons with a pack of 32 cards and a joker. Each player receives 10 cards, and highest bidder for the widow (the three...

Nikopol, city, Ukraine

(Encyclopedia)Nikopol nyĭkôˈpəl [key], city (1989 pop. 158,000), SE Ukraine, on the Dnieper River. It is a rail terminus and the industrial center of one of the world's richest manganese-mining areas. The city ...

Minot

(Encyclopedia)Minot mīˈnät [key], city (1990 pop. 34,544), seat of Ward co., NW N.Dak., on the Souris River; inc. 1887. It is a commercial and transportation center for an extensive agricultural, lignite-mining,...

Sulaiman Mountains

(Encyclopedia)Sulaiman Mountains so͞olīmänˈ [key], range, extending c.250 mi (400 km) from N to S along the western edge of the Indus River valley in E Baluchistan province, central Pakistan. The twin peaks of ...

tidewater

(Encyclopedia)tidewater, in U.S. history, that part of the Atlantic coastal plain between the shoreline and the farthest upstream points in rivers reached by oceanic tides. In many cases the fall line is given as t...

Poissy, Colloquy of

(Encyclopedia)Poissy, Colloquy of pwäsēˈ [key], 1561, conference of Roman Catholic prelates and Protestant ministers, initiated by Catherine de' Medici and Michel de L'Hôpital in the hope of bringing about a pe...

Pukaskwa National Park

(Encyclopedia)Pukaskwa National Park pŭkˈăskwə [key], c.725 sq mi (1,890 sq km), central Ont., Canada, near Marathon; est. 1971. Stretching for c.50 mi (80 km) along the north shore of Lake Superior between the...

crossing over

(Encyclopedia)crossing over, process in genetics by which the two chromosomes of a homologous pair exchange equal segments with each other. Crossing over occurs in the first division of meiosis. At that stage each ...

equinox

(Encyclopedia)equinox ēˈkwĭnŏks [key], either of two points on the celestial sphere where the ecliptic and the celestial equator intersect. The vernal equinox, also known as “the first point of Aries,” is t...

Browse by Subject