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Constitutional Union party

(Encyclopedia)Constitutional Union party, in U.S. history, formed when the conflict between North and South broke down the older parties. The Constitutional Union group, composed of former Whigs and remnants of the...

Brattain, Walter Houser

(Encyclopedia)Brattain, Walter Houser, 1902–87, American physicist, b. Xiamen, China, Ph.D. Univ. of Minnesota, 1929. He was a researcher at Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J. from 1929 to 1967. He then taugh...

Big Ben

(Encyclopedia)Big Ben, the bell in the Parliament tower (Westminster Palace), London, England. It was named for Sir Benjamin Hall, commissioner of works when the bell was installed in 1856. The name is often used t...

Pärt, Arvo

(Encyclopedia)Pärt, Arvo pârt [key], 1935–, Estonian composer, b. Paide; grad. Tallinn Conservatory (1963). He worked for Estonian radio (1958–67), left his homeland (1980, then part of the USSR), and settled...

Anderson, Philip Warren

(Encyclopedia)Anderson, Philip Warren, 1923–2020, American physicist, b. Indianapolis, Ind., Ph.D. Harvard, 1949. After graduation he worked at Bell Laboratories until 1984. From 1967 he also was on the faculty a...

St. John, John Pierce

(Encyclopedia)St. John, John Pierce, 1833–1916, American political reformer, b. Brookville, Ind. He traveled in the West and in South America, fought in the Union army in the Civil War, and after 1869 practiced l...

Bloomsbury group

(Encyclopedia)Bloomsbury group, name given to the literary group that made the Bloomsbury area of London the center of its activities from 1904 to World War II. It included Lytton Strachey, Virginia Woolf, Leonard ...

Loughborough

(Encyclopedia)Loughborough lŭfˈbərə [key], town (1991 pop. 44,895), Leicestershire, central England, on the Soar River. It is a market town with engineering works. Manufactures include hosiery, shoes, pharmaceu...

Shockley, William Bradford

(Encyclopedia)Shockley, William Bradford, 1910–89, American physicist, b. London. He graduated from the California Institute of Technology (B.S., 1932) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Ph.D., 1936)....

Lindley, John

(Encyclopedia)Lindley, John, 1799–1865, English botanist and horticulturist. He organized the first flower shows in England and was influential in preserving the Royal Gardens at Kew (see Kew Gardens). In 1829 he...