Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

286 results found

Glauber's salt

(Encyclopedia)Glauber's salt, common name for sodium sulfate decahydrate, Na2SO4·10H2O; it occurs as white or colorless monoclinic crystals. Upon exposure to fairly dry air it effloresces, forming powdery anhydrou...

Bernstorff, Andreas Peter

(Encyclopedia)Bernstorff, Andreas Peter ändrāˈäs pāˈtər bĕrnsˈtôrf [key], 1735–97, Danish politician; nephew of Johann Hartwig Ernst Bernstorff. Made (1773) foreign minister after Struensee's fall from ...

Donen, Stanley

(Encyclopedia)Donen, Stanley, 1924–2019, American film director, choreographer, and producer, b. Columbia, S.C. He is best known for directing some of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's finest musicals. In 1940 Donen danced i...

Basquiat, Jean-Michel

(Encyclopedia)Basquiat, Jean-Michel bäsˌkē-ätˈ [key], 1960–88, American painter, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. Born into a middle-class Haitian and Puerto Rican family, he was a 1980s art star whose rise and fall were r...

Frescobaldi, Girolamo

(Encyclopedia)Frescobaldi, Girolamo jērôˈlämō frāskōbälˈdē [key], 1583–1643, Italian organist and composer. He became organist at St. Peter's in Rome in 1608, where huge crowds came during most of his l...

Michel, Hartmut

(Encyclopedia)Michel, Hartmut mĭkhˈəl [key], 1948–, German biochemist, Ph.D. Univ. of Würzburg, 1977. Michel was the first person to reduce a photosynthetic action center, which is a four-protein complex, to ...

Zimmermann note

(Encyclopedia)Zimmermann note, secret telegram sent on Jan. 16, 1917, by German foreign secretary Arthur Zimmermann to Count Johann von Bernstorff, the German ambassador to the United States. In it Zimmermann said ...

Moscheles, Ignaz

(Encyclopedia)Moscheles, Ignaz ĭgˈnäts mōshˈəlĕs [key], 1794–1870, Bohemian-German musician. Born in Prague, Moscheles was a child prodigy. He studied in Vienna with Johann Albrechtsberger and Antonio Sali...

Quinet, Edgar

(Encyclopedia)Quinet, Edgar ĕdgärˈ kēnāˈ [key], 1803–75, French historian. A romantic nationalist, he was much influenced by Johann Gottfried von Herder and was a close friend and associate of Jules Michele...

Stendal

(Encyclopedia)Stendal shtĕnˈdäl [key], city (1994 pop. 47,252), Saxony-Anhalt, N central Germany, on the Uchte River. It is a major rail junction and has sugar refineries, metalworks, food canneries, and chemica...