Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Booth, Edwin

(Encyclopedia)Booth, Edwin, 1833–93, one of the first great American actors and the most famous of his era, b. “Tudor Hall,” near Bel Air, Md. After years of touring with his father, Junius Brutus Booth, serv...

Lee, Arthur

(Encyclopedia)Lee, Arthur, 1740–92, American Revolutionary diplomat, b. Westmoreland co., Va.; brother of Francis L. Lee, Richard H. Lee, and William Lee. Educated in Great Britain, he returned to Virginia to pra...

Booth, Junius Brutus

(Encyclopedia)Booth, Junius Brutus, 1796–1852, Anglo-American actor. After experience in the provinces, he appeared at Covent Garden. In 1817, with his portrayal of Richard III, he established himself as a rival ...

Mason, James Murray

(Encyclopedia)Mason, James Murray, 1798–1871, U.S. Senator and Confederate diplomat, b. Georgetown, D.C.; grandson of George Mason. He began to practice law in Winchester, Va., in 1820. Mason served in the Virgin...

Lee, William

(Encyclopedia)Lee, William, 1739–95, American Revolutionary diplomat, b. Westmoreland co., Va.; brother of Arthur Lee, Francis L. Lee, and Richard H. Lee. He opened a business house in London in 1768 and later wa...

Holt, Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Holt, Joseph, 1807–94, American public official, judge advocate general of the U.S. army (1862–75), b. Breckinridge co., Ky. He became a widely known lawyer and political speaker in the old Southw...

Mudd, Samuel Alexander

(Encyclopedia)Mudd, Samuel Alexander, 1833–83, Maryland physician and Confederate sympathizer who on April 15, 1865, set the broken left leg of Lincoln's fleeing assassin, John Wilkes Booth. Mudd was accused of a...

Hale, Horatio Emmons

(Encyclopedia)Hale, Horatio Emmons, 1817–96, American-Canadian ethnologist, b. Newport, N.H.; son of Sarah Josepha Hale. He served as ethnologist on the Charles Wilkes exploring expedition (1838–42) and wrote V...

Dana, James Dwight

(Encyclopedia)Dana, James Dwight, 1813–95, American geologist, mineralogist, and naturalist, b. Utica, N.Y., grad. Yale, 1833. His studies of the S Pacific, NW United States, Europe, and elsewhere led to changes ...

Johnson, Reverdy

(Encyclopedia)Johnson, Reverdy, 1796–1876, American lawyer and statesman, b. Annapolis, Md. Admitted to the bar in 1816, he served in the Maryland legislature (1821–28) and the U.S. Senate (1845–49) and was a...