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Erie Canal

(Encyclopedia)Erie Canal, artificial waterway, c.360 mi (580 km) long; connecting New York City with the Great Lakes via the Hudson River. Locks were built to overcome the 571-ft (174-m) difference between the leve...

Vanderbilt, Cornelius

(Encyclopedia)Vanderbilt, Cornelius, 1794–1877, American railroad magnate, b. Staten Island, N.Y. As a boy he ferried freight and passengers from Staten Island to Manhattan, and he soon gained control of most of ...

Dance Theatre of Harlem

(Encyclopedia)Dance Theatre of Harlem, the first black classical ballet company. The group was founded in Harlem, New York City, by Arthur Mitchell, then of the New York City Ballet, the first African-American prin...

commercial revolution

(Encyclopedia)commercial revolution, in European history, a fundamental change in the quantity and scope of commerce. In the later Middle Ages steady economic expansion had seen the rise of towns and the advent of ...

Jersey City

(Encyclopedia)Jersey City, city (1990 pop. 228,537), seat of Hudson co., NE N.J., a port on a peninsula formed by the Hudson and Hackensack rivers and Upper New York Bay, opposite lower Manhattan; settled before 16...

Locofocos

(Encyclopedia)Locofocos lōˌkōfōˈkōz [key], name given in derision to the members of a faction that split off from the Democratic party in New York in 1835. Tension had been growing between radical Democrats, ...

Reid, Whitelaw

(Encyclopedia)Reid, Whitelaw, 1837–1912, American journalist and diplomat, b. near Xenia, Ohio. His distinguished correspondence during the Civil War for the Cincinnati Gazette led Horace Greeley to make him mana...

Eglevsky, André

(Encyclopedia)Eglevsky, André ändrāˈ ĕgˈlĕvskē [key], 1917–77, Russian–American dancer; b. Moscow. He trained in France and made his debut (1931) in London. Eglevsky danced (1939–42) with the Ballet R...

Ekholm, Gordon Frederick

(Encyclopedia)Ekholm, Gordon Frederick ĕkˈhōlm [key], 1909–87, American archaeologist, b. St. Paul, Minn., Ph.D. Harvard, 1941. Working with the American Museum of Natural History in New York City after 1937, ...

Eames, Wilberforce

(Encyclopedia)Eames, Wilberforce ēmz [key], 1855–1937, American bibliographer, b. Newark, N.J. He joined the staff of the Lenox Library in New York City in 1885 and became its librarian in 1895. After 1911 he wa...