Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

299 results found

gunboat

(Encyclopedia)gunboat, small warship for use on rivers and along coasts in places inaccessible to vessels of larger displacement. In the U.S. Civil War both sides used as gunboats, on the Mississippi and other rive...

Kailas

(Encyclopedia)Kailas kīläsˈ [key], peak, c.22,280 ft (6,790 m) high, SW Tibet region of China, highest point of the Kailas Range, in the Himalayas. It is near the sources of the Sutlej, Indus, and Yarlung Zangbo...

Swansea, town, United States

(Encyclopedia)Swansea swŏnˈzē [key], town (1990 est. pop. 15,500), Bristol co., SE Mass., a suburb of Fall River, on an inlet of Mount Hope Bay; founded 1667, inc. 1785. Once a vast farmland, it has become chief...

Aso-san

(Encyclopedia)Aso-san äˈsō-sän [key] or Mount Aso, volcanic mountain, central Kyushu, Japan. Aso-san is topped by one of the world's largest calderas (circumference 75 mi/121 km) that contains five volcanic con...

Vakhtangov, Yevgeni

(Encyclopedia)Vakhtangov, Yevgeni yĭvgāˈnyē väkhtänˈgôf [key], 1883–1922, Russian actor, producer, and founder of the Moscow theater that bears his name. A pupil and friend of Stanislavsky, Vakhtangov joi...

Yankton, city, United States

(Encyclopedia)Yankton, city (1990 pop. 12,703), seat of Yankton co., extreme SE S.Dak., on the Missouri River; inc. 1869. A railroad and trade center in an agricultural region, it has grain elevators, creameries, a...

Hamilton, Sir William, British diplomat and archaeologist

(Encyclopedia)Hamilton, Sir William, 1730–1803, British diplomat and archaeologist, ambassador to Naples (1764–1800). He was the husband of Emma, Lady Hamilton, mistress of Admiral Horatio Nelson. His fine coll...

Hugenberg, Alfred

(Encyclopedia)Hugenberg, Alfred älˈfrĕt ho͞oˈgənbĕrkh [key], 1865–1951, German financier and politician. He was president of the directorate of the Krupp firm (1909–18), entered the Reichstag in 1919, an...

Altoona

(Encyclopedia)Altoona ălto͞oˈnə [key], industrial city (2020 pop. 43,963), Blair co., central Pa., on the eastern slopes of the Allegheny Mts., near the source of the Juniata River;...

Smith College

(Encyclopedia)Smith College, at Northampton, Mass.; undergraduate for women, graduate coeducational; chartered 1871, opened 1875 through a bequest of Sophia Smith. The first president, Laurenus Clark Seelye, was in...