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Northumbria, kingdom of

(Encyclopedia)Northumbria, kingdom of nôrthŭmˈbrēˈə [key], one of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in England. It was originally composed of two independent kingdoms divided by the Tees River, Bernicia (including mod...

Holocaust Memorial Museum, United States

(Encyclopedia)Holocaust Memorial Museum, United States, in Washington, D.C. on the National Mall, memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. Designed by architect James Ingo Freed, it opened in 1993. Using a stark, ...

Gordon, Ruth

(Encyclopedia)Gordon, Ruth, 1896–1985, American actress and playwright, b. Wollaston, Mass. From her debut as Nibs in Peter Pan (1915), Gordon's career encompassed broad stage and film experience. Among the plays...

Leiter, Saul

(Encyclopedia)Leiter, Saul lītˈər [key], 1923–2013, American photographer, b. Pittsburgh. A painter in the early 1940s, Leiter switched to photography late in the decade. Along with Robert Frank and Diane Arbu...

Tranströmer, Tomas

(Encyclopedia)Tranströmer, Tomas, 1931–2015, Swedish poet, b. Stockholm, grad. Stockholm Univ. (1956), Sweden's (and Scandinavia's) greatest late 20th- and early 21st-century poet. First published in the 1950s, ...

Avedon, Richard

(Encyclopedia)Avedon, Richard, 1923–2004, American photographer, b. New York City. Son of Russian-Jewish immigrants, he studied philosophy at Columbia, served in the photographic section of the U.S. Merchant Mari...

O'Connor, Flannery

(Encyclopedia)O'Connor, Flannery (Mary Flannery O'Connor), 1925–64, American author, b. Savannah, Ga., grad. Women's College of Georgia (A.B., 1945), Iowa State Univ. (M.F.A., 1947). As a writer, O'Connor is high...

Losey, Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Losey, Joseph lōˈzē [key], 1909–84, American film director, b. La Crosse, Wis. Among his Hollywood works, many of which dealt with social issues, are The Boy With Green Hair (1948) and M (1951). ...

Sackville-West, Vita

(Encyclopedia)Sackville-West, Vita (Victoria Mary Sackville-West), 1892–1962, English writer; wife of Sir Harold Nicolson and granddaughter of the 2d Baron Sackville. Both she and Nicolson were members of the Blo...

Public Works Administration

(Encyclopedia)Public Works Administration (PWA), in U.S. history, New Deal government agency established (1933) by the Congress as the Federal Administration of Public Works, pursuant to the National Industrial Rec...