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Brunel, Sir Marc Isambard

(Encyclopedia)Brunel, Sir Marc Isambard ĭzˈəmbärdˌ bro͞onĕlˈ [key], 1769–1849, British engineer and inventor. Born in France, he came to the United States in 1793 as a royalist refugee. He became chief en...

Willkie, Wendell Lewis

(Encyclopedia)Willkie, Wendell Lewis, 1892–1944, American industrialist and political leader, b. Elwood, Ind. After graduating from Indiana Univ. law school (1916), he practiced law in Ohio and then New York (192...

Beecher, Henry Ward

(Encyclopedia)Beecher, Henry Ward, 1813–87, American Congregational preacher, orator, and lecturer, b. Litchfield, Conn.; son of Lyman Beecher and brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe. He graduated from Amherst in 18...

Charles X, king of Sweden

(Encyclopedia)Charles X, 1622–60, king of Sweden (1654–60), nephew of Gustavus II. The son of John Casimir, count palatine of Zweibrücken, he brought the house of Wittelsbach to the Swedish throne when his cou...

Mecklenburg–West Pomerania

(Encyclopedia)Mecklenburg–West Pomerania mĕkˈlənbo͝orkh pämərāˈnēə [key], state (1994 pop. 1,890,000), 9,201 sq mi (23,838 sq km), NE Germany, bordering on the Baltic Sea. Schwerin is the capital. The r...

Ruthven

(Encyclopedia)Ruthven rĭvˈən, ro͞othˈvən [key], Scottish noble family, believed to trace its ancestry to Thor, a Saxon or Dane, who settled in Scotland in the reign of David I. The name is derived from lands ...

Burke, Edmund

(Encyclopedia)Burke, Edmund, 1729–97, British political writer and statesman, b. Dublin, Ireland. Burke left, in his many and diverse writings, a monumental construction of British political thought that had fa...

squirrel

(Encyclopedia)squirrel, name for small or medium-sized rodents of the family Sciuridae, found throughout the world except in Australia, Madagascar, and the polar regions; it is applied especially to the tree-living...

Nuremberg

(Encyclopedia)Nuremberg nürnˈbĕrkˌ [key], city (1994 pop. 498,945), Bavaria, S Germany, on the Pegnitz River and the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal. One of the great historic cities of Germany, Nuremberg is now an imp...

Genovese, Eugene Dominick

(Encyclopedia)Genovese, Eugene Dominick, 1930–2012, American historian, b. Brooklyn, N.Y., grad. Brooklyn College (B.A., 1953), Columbia (M.A., 1955; Ph.D., 1959). Known for his penetrating studies of slavery and...